Time and Space
by Katty008
Summary: A series of one-shots, two-shots, and occasional arching plots. Up Next: Kuroba Toichi would like to state that being dead is overrated. It generally leads to homelessness, destitution, and irony. Never trust a vortex manipulator.
1. Time and Space and Saguru

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and Saguru**

**Summary: Because he wouldn't have missed it for the world, he told me himself. And if you hadn't noticed, he is currently grinning gleefully in his sleep. That is why I am kidnapping him.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Magic Kaito. That would be Gosho Aoyama.**

**This idea came to me as I was listening to the eighth DC opening, and realized that the first five seconds sounded disturbingly like the first five seconds of the Doctor Who theme. Namely, the Peter Davison era. And since my mind is one that makes obscure connections at the tip of the hat, I ended up with the idea that Hakuba must be a Doctor Who fan. Which led to this.**

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_Someone_ had a personal radio on in the classroom again. And _someone_ was playing music loudly.

A certain half-British detective was doing his best to ignore it. And he was mostly succeeding. Mostly. Until a new song started, at which point his head jerked up. But it slowly moved back down as the plain music gave way to lyrics.

"_Koi wa thrill, shock, suspense…"_

Kaito looked over at him confusedly. "Hakuba, were you actually interested in the music?"

He shook his head. "No, I just thought it was something else."

Suddenly Kaito was in front of him, a curious look on his face. "What else?"

Okay, so maybe he had charged blindly into that one. "Just a TV show."

Aoko joined in. "A TV show? That is the opening for some anime I think…"

"No, it isn't that. It's a TV show back in England called Doctor Who."

Kaito chose that moment to lose the poker face and display one of the most confused looks Hakuba had ever seen. "Doctor Who? What idiot came up with that name?"

Never let it be said that at heart, Hakuba Saguru wasn't British. He decidedly was. One thing about decidedly being British was being calm and collected. Another thing was to throw the previous sentence out the window when it came to Doctor Who. "I'll have you know that Doctor Who is the longest-running science-fiction show in the WORLD!"

Kaito blinked in an entirely uncaring way. "Isn't that Star Trek?"

"It doesn't count, because it's a bunch of different series. But even if it did, Doctor Who would still be longer. Doctor Who first aired in 1963!"

Aoko was curious. "What's it about?"

"The Doctor, an alien travelling through all of time and space defeating bad guys! He travels around in his TARDIS, stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space, which is permanently disguised as a blue Police Public Call Box from the 1950's because his Chameleon Circuit broke while he was in a junkyard in the 1960's. And there's all sorts of aliens and stuff and he has loads of luck with the ladies, regardless of how alien he is. He's also very rude, and never ginger."

Kaito and Aoko both blinked this time. "Do… do you like this show much?" Aoko eventually ventured.

"_Yes._" Hakuba answered, almost lustily.

Kaito and Aoko slowly moved away, and silently vowed never to play Koi wa Thrill, Shock, Suspense in Hakuba Saguru's presence ever again.

But, Hakuba's conversation with Kaito and Aoko had given him an idea for the next heist. As many times as Kid had pulled the rug out from under him, he was still convinced he was Kuroba Kaito. And the next heist, supposed to take place in a week, concerned a gemstone stored in a perfectly round room. Catch the curiosity, catch the Kid. And if Kid really was Kuroba Kaito, Hakuba Saguru knew just what kind of trap would work.

Kaito Kid slunk around the hallway completely surrounding the round room within which his target was kept. Policemen today were conspicuous in their absence, so Kaito was decidedly more careful than normal. Now if only he could find that door…

Strange… that was definitely _not_ there during surveillance earlier.

'That' being a blue box shoved in between two pillars. Said blue box looked a bit on the old-fashioned side, not to mention completely out of place and rather beat up. Kaito paused, blinked, then realized what was going on: Hakuba Saguru was still convinced that Kaito Kid was Kuroba Kaito, a theory that, although 100% true, was practically completely unfounded.

Because this blue box was obviously supposed to be the 'TARDIS' from that 'Doctor Who' show Hakuba had been talking about- nay, obsessing over- just last week. And he was trying to use it as a curiosity-grabber. Kaito grinned to himself. _Hakuba, you are an idiot._

Not so much though apparently, as Kaito found himself gravitating towards the strange object. He pushed gently on the door, which eased open. He expected to find what one would expect to find: a small dark area. The inside of a box. However, he did not.

His eyes instantly locked with those of a blond girl about to set a hoodie on some sort of couch. A male voice came from down a hallway. "Rose, did you forget to shut the door properly again? The TARDIS is ringing alarms in my head… Oh! Kaito Kid, 1412! I've always wanted to meet you! Judging by the monocle as opposed to the mask you'd be the second generation, am I correct? How close are you to finding Pandora? Must not be very close, as Kudo isn't two feet behind you, making this the early years. Do you even know what Pandora is yet?"

**Meanwhile…**

Hakuba sauntered down the hall. It was about time for the heist, and he figured he'd better get in position so he could lock Kid in the box the second he entered. Curiosity caught the thief and all that. When he did see Kid walk into the box, he leapt for the door and slammed it shut, jamming his key in the keyhole. There would be a prisoner in the Police Box again.

Until the keyhole decided that it did not like the key anymore and forcibly shoved it out.

Hakuba's eyes moved from the key to the keyhole, then back to the key. Keyholes did not generally suddenly decide to force keys out. Last time he checked, keyholes did not have conscience thought.

**Meanwhile meanwhile…**

"Rose, could you let our second guest in? I don't think our first guest quite has the mental capacity at the moment, and the TARDIS is complaining about someone trying to shove a key in her keyhole."

Rose silently opened the door, to reveal a frustrated Hakuba. Said frustration quickly morphed into a strange combination of shock, joy, incredulity, I-just-died-and-went-to-Heaven, and slack jaw. All seconds before he keeled over in a dead faint.

The Doctor walked over. "Hakuba Saguru, hmm? Must be _really_ early years then. No wonder Kudo isn't around, he's still a little short. I should go pay him a visit some time, he could use some cheering up."

**Meanwhile meanwhile meanwhile…**

Edogawa Conan/Kudo Shinichi sneezed. Funny. This was the first time sneezing had been associated with the transformation process.

**Meanwhile meanwhile meanwhile meanwhile…**

Inspector Nakamori glared at his watch. Hakuba Saguru was a bit weird at times, but this was ridiculous. "Screw this. MOVE OUT!"

The policemen surrounding him quickly complied.

**Meanwhile meanwhile meanwhile meanwhile meanwhile…**

"So… you're going to fly off to travel through time and space."

"Yep!"

Kaito pointed at the still-unconscious Hakuba. "And you're going to take him with you."

"Yep!"

"Without his consent."

"Yep!"

"Two things. One, that will make him very angry at you. Two, why can't I come?"

"Because he's coming with us, and that would just be awkward."

"But why don't you take me instead of him? He's not even conscious to protest this."

"Because he wouldn't have missed it for the world, he told me himself. Also, you need to take care of that little issue of Pandora, because I'd rather not involve myself in that fight. And if you hadn't noticed, he is currently grinning gleefully in his sleep. Toodles!"

Kaito Kid found himself roughly thrown out of the TARDIS as it started sounding like an odd combination of mechanical parts rubbing together and Darth Vadar. It also disappeared from sight.

Kaito Kid staggered off, canceling the heist.

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**And yes, I did that just to get away with the Meanwhiles.**

**Has anyone played the Avernum games? I'm playing the fourth one with my characters being Kaito, Saguru, Shinichi, and Heiji. And currently I'm destroying chitrachs, which have venomous fangs. This is annoying, because roughly every two chitrachs I destroy, I have to run back to Fort Dranlon to revive Shinichi because he got poisoned ****again**** and died ****again**** before I could cure him, I kid you not. No one else ever gets poisoned, just him. It's like someone put a "Bite Me" sign on his back. Ah, the irony.**

**I may have to do a fic involving that… it could be AU…**


	2. Time and Space and Shiho

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and Shiho**

**Summary: Ai's perusal of a magazine is interrupted by our favorite time-traveling alien. No he's not fictional. That sure surprised her. Yes he is the Doctor. No surprise there. He brings Saguru as well.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor**** Kaito, Magic Conan, or Detective Who. Err... Doctor Who, Magic Kaito, and Detective Conan. I'll have to keep that in mind though. Maybe someday I will own Doctor Kaito, Magic Conan, and Detective Who.**

**I couldn't stop laughing as I wrote this. I think I've made the Doctor sufficiently batshit insane. Because no one writes the Doctor batshit insane, even though he is. It also features my new favorite crack theory, where Shiho and Saguru are cousins descended from the...**

**(is pulled off stage before she can say more.)**

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Now, just because Ai happened to be a genius scientist, it didn't mean she wasn't interested in fashion. She was a teenage girl after all, and those are notoriously interested in fashion. There is the occasional weirdo of course, but not Ai.

So it was with more than a little dismay that her perusal of a fashion magazine was interrupted by the sound of various mechanical parts rubbing together combined with Darth Vadar. Thinking the interruption was the Professor blowing something up over the span of several seconds as opposed to milliseconds, she marked her spot and prepared to head to the lab to see if he needed rescuing. She turned the corner into the hallway to run into... a blue box blocking her way.

She looked at the brown-haired who stepped from the blue box. "Your blue box is blocking my way."

The man looked like he was mulling over what she just said. "Blocking blue box... that is a good bit of alliteration there. Of course there's always bulging blue box, or blushing blue budgerigar in a black box. Blushing blue budgerigar in a bulging black box. Blushing blue budgerigar-"

A second person, a blond teenager, stepped from the box. "I'm getting used to having to say this: shut up." He then looked at Ai. "I thought you said you had the coordinates right? And by right supposedly you meant within the year."

The first person picked Ai up by the back of her shirt and held her up to his view. "Oh, I've got the right time all right. Your favorite cousin's just run into a spot of bother." He threw her at the second person, who caught her.

He looked at her, then shrugged. "Hello Shi-chan."

Ai finally recognized the person, and her brain started beating itself against her skull for incompetence. "Sa-chan!" The two hugged, then Saguru set Ai back down.

"Shi sa," the brown-haired man remarked. "She saw. Seesaw. Seaweed."

Saguru looked to his companion again. "Shut up." He then turned back to Ai. "Shi-chan, what have you gotten yourself into?"

Ai gave him a look. "Would you believe me if I told you?"

Saguru pointed over his shoulder at his companion, who was spinning in circles and mutturing about Cleopatra's hair. "I travel around with him. If I'm batty enough to do that, I'm batty enough to believe whatever you can throw at me."

Ai grabbed her cousin's hand and dragged him over to the couch. They sat down, Saguru staring at Ai for several minutes while his companion tore apart the kitchen looking for... what was he saying? Cookie gremlins?

"Akemi's dead," Ai finally said.

"I'm sorry."

Ai shrugged, not quite masking her pain. "It happened a while ago."

"Them?" Saguru asked.

Ai nodded. "She was trying to get out."

Saguru nodded, understanding. There was a bit of a 'don't mention' thing about Them in their family. His uncle had turned to Them when no one else would take his findings seriously. Then his aunt had married him, and ended up kind of with Them as well. It screamed against all of his detective instincts to not rat Them out, but he knew if he did a lot of people would die, himself notwithstanding. "What about you?"

Ai shrugged, in a 'what you see is what you get' sort of way. "They're after me. This is my diguise. It's worked so far."

Saguru's travelling friend poked his head out of the kitchen, his fingers in a jar of marmalade. "Saguru, we shouldn't hang around here too long. It could be dangerous."

"Don't you usually run towards the danger?" Saguru quipped dryly.

The man's face darkened. "Not anymore."

Ai looked at him. "What is your name anyway?"

The man pointed at himself. "Oh, me? I'm the Doctor."

Ai nodded slowly. The hand outside of the Doctor's view was spinning circles around her ear in the universal symbol for insanity. Saguru shrugged. "He's the Doctor."

The Doctor winked at her. "The Doctor."

"Aren't you fictional?"

Saguru blinked at her. "The blue box didn't tip you off?"

Ai glared at him. "I have other things on my mind at the moment."

The Doctor picked up her magazine and started flipping through it. "Like fashion it seems. Oh, that'll go out of style real fast."

Ai glanced at what he was looking at. And she had been thinking of sewing something like that. Well, now she knew better. "So now Sa-chan is your companion?"

The man looked slightly distressed. "Yes... Yes, Saguru is my companion. Can't get rid of him. But yes. Just him and me, in the TARDIS, time and space and all that. Just him and me. Just him and me."

Ai caught Saguru's look which said not to ask. Then Saguru seemed to get an idea. "Doctor, why can't Shi-chan come with us?"

The Doctor shook his head vehemently. "No! No no no no. No no no. Elle ne va pas. Timelines. She's important here."

Saguru raised an eyebrow. "She's important enough that even you wouldn't pick her up."

The Doctor nodded. "Trust me, she's not coming with us. Maybe some other time."

The sound of the front door opening interrupted their conversation. "Professor!" a young boy's voice called out.

"Kudo-kun," Ai said quietly.

"Huh?" Saguru responded eloquently.

"Spoilers!" the Doctor whisper-shouted. "Come on Saguru, allons-y! Bye Shiho, nice to meet you!" He dragged the protesting Saguru back to the TARDIS. The noise of mechanical parts and Darth Vadar started, then stopped.

Conan entered the living room where Ai was once again flipping through her fashion magazine. He looking slightly confused and bewildered. Ai glanced at him. "What's that look for?"

Conan blinked at her several times, then shook his head rapidly. "You won't believe what happened at the park today."

"Try me."

The two of them stared at each other for several tense moments. Finally Conan looked away. "Nah. Better not. Time is weird." He then ambled off in the direction of the lab.

Ai almost hazarded a guess as to what he was referring to, but changed her mind.

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**In Time and Space and Saguru, it was clearly Ten and Rose in the TARDIS. Now it's clearly Ten and Saguru. Timeline-wise, this could be any time where Ten is without a companion, but with the dialogue I'm hinting towards after Runaway Bride. The Doctor, under his insanity, is being all depressed and suicidal. Cookie gremlins are vicious!**

**Reviews please!**


	3. Time and Space and Shinichi: Part 1

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and Shinichi: Part 1**

**Summary: Conan's in the park with a dead body, a blue box, and a shipload of aliens. The sonic screwdriver is weirding out, Saguru's been captured by the human-eating aliens, and Shiho's wondering why she isn't dead yet. It's because she runs really fast.**

**Disclaimer: Me no owny Doctor Who or Detective Conan.**

**This one will be split into two different parts because it just got so long. Also there's actual aliens in it. Other than the Doctor that is. And the TARDIS. The TARDIS is living, so she counts as her own alien entity.**

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The Detective Boys were at the park, doing what most kids did at the park: play hide and seek. Or they were. Now they were in a spot of bother, because they had just found a dead body.

"I'll call Inspector Megure!" Conan said, pulling out his cell phone.

A hand reached down to stop him. "Nah, better not. He's probably busy."

Conan looked up at the brown-haired man. The man looked quite serious, but Conan couldn't help but sense a little bit of jollity coming from him. "Who are you?"

The man flashed a piece of paper at them. "Police. Don't worry, everything's all right. Now, tell me what happened."

"We were playing hide and seek!" Genta said.

"And I decided to hide behind these bushes!" Ayumi added.

"And then she screamed really loudly," Mitsuhiko pointed out.

Conan pointed at the body. "And there was someone dead here."

The man nodded. "I see." There was the noise of rustling leaves and two blond teenagers came out from the woods on the other side of the path. "Where have you two been?"

"We found tracks, they're back that way," the male teenager said, pointing over his shoulder.

"They test positive as Hadronids," the female teenager added, throwing something small and skinny at the brown-haired man.

The man caught the blue and silver stick and pointed it at the dead body. The stick made a slight buzzing noise, then the man pocketed it. "So does this." He looked to the Detective Boys. "Well you kids can go home now, we've got this all handled."

"But we want to help investigate!" Ayumi protested.

"We're the Detective Boys!" Genta added.

The brown-haired man kneeled down to look Genta in the eye. "You may be, but this is a bit out of your league. Don't worry, I've got it covered. I'll find who did it!"

There was a slight snerking sound. Conan looked away from the man to see that the blond woman looked about to explode from holding in her laughter. The brown-haired man also noticed. "Is there a problem?"

She waved her hand at him. "Oh no, do go on," she said, sickly sweet and still giggling. "Don't let me stop you. Good luck!"

Conan frowned at her. "Hey guys, maybe we should go home."

The other three Detective Boys looked at him, wide-eyed. "Go home?" Genta queried.

"You think we should go home?" Mitsuhiko asked in a tone that implied sacrilige.

Conan shrugged. "They're professionals. They seem to know what they're doing."

Ayumi punched the air. "All right! If Conan thinks we should go home, then we're going home!"

Genta and Mitsuhiko also suddenly punched the air. "All right!" they echoed.

The brown-haired man stood up, ruffling Mitsuhiko's hair. "Good children. Have fun!"

"Okay!" the Detective Boys said. They then ran off out of the park.

Not very far, Conan stopped. "Hey guys, I just remembered that I have to go home early today. Have fun without me!"

"Okay!"

"Bye Conan!" And then they were lost once again in their discussion of Kamen Yaiba.

Once the Detective Boys were out of sight, Conan turned around and backtracked back to the park. He went back to the place where the body was. It was still there, but the three strangers were gone. Remembering which direction the two blonds had come from, he snuck quietly through the bushes. He soon came to a small clearing. There was still mud on the ground, and in it were several pairs of decidedly reptilian feet. Warning bells were going off in Conan's head because no reptiles he knew of in the area had feet that big. He realized that those must be the footprints that the blonds were referring to. The woman had called them Hadronids.

There suddenly came a great crashing sound, shaking Conan from his musings. Out of the bushes burst first the brown-haired man, then the blond woman. "YOU ARE AN IDIOT!" she shouted.

"How was I supposed to know the sonic screwdriver identifies by planet?" the man asked.

"YOU BUILT IT!" the woman shouted back. The two of them panted for several moments. "So they're not Hadronids," she finally said. "What are they?"

"Dihaclyds," the man said. "Also from the planet Hadronia."

The woman looked around. "Where's Sa-chan?"

The man also looked around. "It seems he has been separated from us."

The woman threw her hands up in the air. "Great. There are human-eating Dihaclyds not Hadronids from the planet Hadronia wandering around the park and quite possibly more of Tokyo, and my cousin is lost."

"Not lost," the man said. "Saguru has an excellent internal compass. More likely he has been captured."

The woman glared at the man. "If anything happens to him, I'll kill you."

They finally noticed that Conan was there as well. "Hello," the man said. "I thought you went home with your friends."

Conan was busily studying the woman. "I turned back. Was curious."

"And suspicious?" the woman asked. Conan nodded.

The crashing of the trees suddenly began again in earnest. "RUN!" the man shouted, picking Conan up and slinging him over his shoulder. The three of them fled through the woods, finally reaching a blue box. The man set Conan down and started fumbling with a key.

"Hurry up hurry up hurry up!" the woman chanted.

"I'm going... there!" he said triumphantly, throwing open the door. The two of them ran in and when Conan was reluctant to hide in a wooden box, he was dragged in as well.

The door was slammed shut and the two people sighed in relief. Then the woman got angry again. "Well now what?"

The man pointed at the door. "Genghis Khan couldn't get in here. We're safe."

"Genghis Khan wasn't an army of Dihaclyds," the woman pointed out. "And what about Sa-chan?"

The man went silent.

"It's bigger on the inside," Conan remarked quietly.

The woman nodded. "Yes, it is. I repeat: what about Saguru?"

"Well, they do like the taste of human flesh..." the man finally said.

The woman's eyes starting tearing up. "I hate you," she finally said.

The man suddenly got a manic grin. "But I have a solution!"

The woman looked skeptical. "Yeah?"

"We didn't _see_ his death or capture, so we don't _know_ he's dead or captured. We just _think_ he's dead or captured," he said, bouncing around the central column and flipping levers.

Conan started as the blue box... bigger on the inside... thing... started rocking slightly. The woman didn't look perturbed in the least. Conan knew, because he was watching her closely. "Isn't this dangerous?" she remarked.

The man shook his head. "No, we just have to be a little careful."

"Who the hell _are_ you?" Conan asked, finally finding his voice.

"I'm the Doctor! And she's my lovely companion-"

"Shi," she remarked, cutting him off. "I'm Shi."

The Doctor opened his mouth to talk, but Shi cut it off with a warning glare. He closed it, looking like a scolded puppy.

"What is this?" Conan asked, gesturing to the thing around him.

"TARDIS," Shi replied. "Time machine, basically."

"Time AND space!" the Doctor objected. "Time And Relative Dimensions In Space."

"So... are we going to..." Conan paused, remembering, "Hadronia?"

The Doctor shook his head. "Oh no. We're only going back in time by about ten minutes."

"The Doctor thinks he can save Saguru and not cause a huge paradox."

"I know someone named Saguru," Conan said, thinking.

The Doctor continued to bounce around the column as he replied, "Hakuba Saguru, the guy who's always chasing Kid around? Or used to be chasing Kid around. Is he still chasing Kid around? I'm bad with exact dates like that. But that Saguru? Yep, we've got that Saguru. The one you first met at that house made of gold when Kid disguised himself as Sleeping Kogorou."

Conan frowned in suspicion. "You don't even know who I am."

"'Course I do. You're Edogawa Conan, aka Kudo Shinichi." The Doctor's head suddenly jerked back in surprise. "And you're _really_ fast with that dart gun of yours. Don't shoot the designated driver Mr. Detective."

"Are you with the Black Organization?" Conan queried.

"No," the Doctor decidedly stated. "Definitely not. I run around the universe causing chaos wherever I go, but in the name of good. Never in all of time and space would I be with them."

"Believe him," Shi added.

"Besides, if the Black Organization had a time machine, can you imagine the kind of trouble they'd cause?"

Conan had to agree that the world would be a whole worse off if the Black Organization had a time machine. "But how do you know who I am?"

The TARDIS suddenly stopped rocking. "We've landed!" the Doctor exclaimed. "Let's go kiddies!"

"I resent that," Shi said as she followed him to the door. Conan, having nothing better to do, followed them. They exited the TARDIS back in Beika Park, but a different part of it.

The Doctor pulled out the blue stick and made it buzz some more. "What is that?" Conan asked.

"Sonic screwdriver. The ultimate in multi-purpose."

"But it has some classification problems," Shi added.

The Doctor glared at her. "I'm picking up a group of Dihaclyds and one human this way. Come on." Shi and Conan followed the Doctor through the trees until they reached a clearing. At the center was a large space ship. The Doctor whistled, impressed. "That is one hell of a cloaking device."

Shi was already standing at what appeared to be the door to the ship. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go save Sa-chan."

The Doctor muttered something about women as he approached her, Conan following. Together the three of them snuck into the alien ship. Conan couldn't help but gasp in awe. The Doctor and Shi both glared at him. Conan looked bashful and they continued on. The further into the ship they got, the more excited the Doctor became, getting to the point where he was ooh-ing and awe-ing over various bits of technology. Finally Shi hit him. "Focus on the task at hand."

The sonic screwdriver stopped buzzing. The Doctor shook it and held it up to his ear. "The batteries are dead."

"Why am I still alive?" Shi asked.

"Because you run really fast."

Shi glared at him. "Well which way should Sa-chan be in?"

The Doctor pointed. He then spun around so he was facing the opposite direction. "That way!" They started walking the way he was pointing.

The sounds of a fight hastened their pace. The sounds of an explosion hastened them even more. They ran around a corner and the Doctor ran straight into a middle-aged woman, both of them falling to the floor. The woman looked at the group. "Who the hell are you? What are you doing here?"

"Ace!"

"Who the hell is she?" Shi and Conan asked together.

"What are you three doing here? This place is dangerous!"

"Ace, it's me!"

"Who the hell are you?"

"Doctor, who the hell is she?"

The strange woman gaped. "Doctor?"

The Doctor grabbed the woman's hand. "Nevermind, RUN!"

Still holding the woman's hand, he started dragging her off in the opposite direction they had been going as some aliens rounded the corner. Conan grew bug-eyed, but didn't get a very good look before Shi scooped him up and chased after the Doctor. The four of them ran amongst the complicated corridors, the Doctor and Ace ahead of Shi and Conan. Shi and Conan rounded a corner... to find Ace and the Doctor gone.

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**And now we've got Ten and Saguru and Shi-- in the TARDIS. And Ace? I have no idea where she came from. Usually if a character is going to jump out of nowhere for me it's Romana. Maybe Ace IS Romana. Reviews please!**


	4. Time and Space and Shinichi: Part 2

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and Shinichi: Part 2**

**Disclaimer: Me no owny Doctor Who or Detective Conan.**

**Voila! Part 2!**

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_Still holding the woman's hand, he started dragging her off in the opposite direction they had been going as some aliens rounded the corner. Conan grew bug-eyed, but didn't get a very good look before Shi scooped him up and chased after the Doctor. The four of them ran amongst the complicated corridors, the Doctor and Ace ahead of Shi and Conan. Shi and Conan rounded a corner... to find Ace and the Doctor gone._

"Where did they go?" Shi nearly screamed. Still carrying Conan, she darted around looking for them. Finally she set Conan down in order to violently kick something. "Damn it!"

The thing she kicked beeped in response and a hidden door slid into the wall. The corridor beyond was darker than the rest of the ship, and quite long. Shi and Conan looked at each other. "Game?" he asked.

"It's as good as anything else," Shi replied, and they started walking down the corridor.

As they walked their eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness. The walls were spotless, no electrical outlets, control panels, or lengths of wire of any sort. What little light there was seemed to come from the walls themselves. They walked for several minutes, finally coming to a dead end. Shi and Conan both searched the close area for some sort of way to open it, to no avail. Shi finally shrugged and kicked the dead end violently. It beeped again and the dead end became another open door.

Shi and Conan looked at each other again. "Someone likes their labyrinths," Conan remarked.

"And I don't like it. Come on."

The corridor beyond was much like the rest of the ship, and not like the one they had just been in. "So who are you?" Conan asked.

"I'm Shi," she responded.

"That's not what the Doctor was going to introduce you as."

"And I stopped him because you can't know me. Not yet anyway."

"So that really is a time machine?"

Shi nodded. "Yes. And paradoxes are dangerous things, so don't ask me again."

They came to a crossroads in the path. On either side were more corridors, and in front of them was a big door. "So do we wander more or see what's behind the door?" Conan asked.

"Door," Shi said. "If nothing else it'll be easier for the Doctor to find us again if we're not wandering."

"By choice or captivity?" Conan asked rhetorically as Shi eased open the door. The two of them walked in, looking around. Conan shivered. It felt like a fridge. Then he saw the large chunks of meat hanging from rows of hooks. It was a fridge. "The Dihaclyds... they eat humans, isn't that what you said?"

Shi nodded numbly. "There's another door at the other end. Let's get out of here before they get hungry."

They quickly moved to the other door, easing it open as well. Shi sniffed, and groaned. "Ugh. Something reeks."

Conan frowned. "It smells like blood. A lot of it."

The room beyond was smaller than the fridge but not by much. In the midde was a large table, large than most human tables. The floor around it was brown with dried blood. The Dihaclyds obviously didn't clean up very well. "It's a butcher's table," Shi remarked. "There's a block of knives right there... really big knives."

One wall was lined with cages, obviously where the Dihaclyds put their prey before cutting them up. Conan noticed that one of them was occupied. "Look!"

Shi rushed to the cage. "Saguru!" She tried to open the cage door but it was locked securely. "Saguru! Saguru!" Saguru didn't respond, thoroughly unconscious.

Conan reached between the bars with his small limbs and felt the other detective's pulse. "He's still alive. Probably just been drugged or knocked out."

Shi cast around. "We've got to find the keys. They've got to be around here somewhere."

Another door that they hadn't noticed before suddenly opened. "Hide!" Shi hissed, ducking herself and Conan into the dim light behind Saguru's cage. A giant reptile, large than most humans by about a foot, strode in. He walked on two feet, had green scaly skin, and large flaps for ears. From his belt hung a ring of keys, probably the ones they needed. Two more Dihaclyds followed him in, each carrying something. The first Dihaclyd walked over to the row of cages, but thankfully didn't notice Conan and Shi. He unlocked two of them. "Stick them in," he commanded, his voice deep and rough.

The other two Dihaclyds each put their burdens in a cage. Conan felt hopelessness start to overwhelm him. It was the Doctor and the woman named Ace! The first Dihaclyd locked the cages, and the other two left. He moved to the table and set the keys on top of it. He then picked up the largest knife and started sharpening it. The loud noise filled the room.

"Shit," Shi whispered. "Even if we could get the keys without him noticing, I can't move all three of them."

"Psst!"

Shi and Conan's heads jerked towards the Doctor, who grinned at them. "You're awake!" Shi exclaimed quietly.

The Doctor looked affronted. "Time Lord physiology, remember? Which'll be a bad thing if they find out, because supposedly Time Lord meat is particularly tasty. They'll obliterate Earth looking for more. Which they won't find of course, but they won't know that."

"Stop babbling and tell us how to get you guys out!"

The Doctor took stock of the occupants of the other cages. "Ace and Saguru, so we're all here. Well, the usual way to get someone out of a cage is to unlock the cage."

Shi pointed at the Dihaclyd butcher. The Doctor's face fell. "Oh."

"Oh indeed. Now how do we get you out oh mighty one?"

The Doctor bit his lower lip. "Well... without the sonic screwdriver... I... don't... know..."

"Surely you have something in those dimensionally transcendant pockets of yours."

The Doctor started searching the pockets of his coat vigorously, muttering to himself. "Piece of string... banana, oh that's got to be old by now... first draft of the Constitution... wind-up mouse... a locket with a broken chain... dead sonic screwdriver... bag of cookies... French-Gallifreyan dictionary... a pear, what is that doing there?" He pulled out the pear and deposited it on the floor of the cage with a look of disgust, then went back to rummaging. "Black marker... my pet budgerigar... Remember when we first met Shi? I had to get a budgerigar just because of that. A blue one, mind you. It doesn't blush though. I don't think budgerigars can blush, even blue ones. It's not in a black box either..."

"Doctor..." Shi warned.

"Right... two triple-A batteries... a toy soldier... hang on." He pulled the sonic screwdriver and the two batteries out of his coat pocket. He unscrewed the end of the screwdriver and two triple-A batteries landed in his hand. He stuck those in his pocket and inserted the two new ones. He screwed the end back on, and the screwdriver lit up. "Bingo!" he said, a huge grin on his face.

Shi and Conan both glared at him, dumbfounded. "The batteries were dead... but you had spares in your pocket," Shi stated evenly.

"Hey, don't blame me. I didn't remember that I had spares in my pocket."

"A super-advanced tool from outer space... takes two triple-A batteries?" Conan asked, the idea completely going over his head.

The Doctor ignored him, attempting to unlock the lock on his cage. Shi glanced at the butcher, who was still sharpening his knives with gusto. "I don't think we have very much longer."

The sonic screwdriver suddenly stopped buzzing. "Deadlocked," the Doctor said simply.

Shi banged her head against the wall behind her. "Start improvising then."

The Doctor grasped the bars of the cage, testing them. "Wood."

"What can you do with wood?"

"Well I can set it on fire, but I don't think that would work very well in the long run. However, for some reason the wood is joined by small blocks of concrete. Not the lightest of building materials, but if the shoe fits..." The sonic screwdriver started buzzing again.

"Now what are you doings?"

"Trying to resonate concrete."

"Hey Doctor?" Conan asked.

"What?"

"How thick do you suppose the heads of Dihaclyds are?"

"Well, they actually get knocked out quite easily," the Doctor responded absent-mindedly. "Which is surprising, because otherwise they're physically sound. Why do you ask Conan?" When Conan didn't answer, he looked up. "Conan? Oh no..."

Conan had left the safety of the shadows and was sneaking around behind the Dihaclyd looking for something round. He finally found something. He would have preferred something that didn't look like (and probably was) a half-rotted human skull, but beggars can't be choosers. Powering up his shoes, he kicked it straight at the large Dihaclyd.

The Dihaclyd was out in an instant. The Doctor started clapping. "Oh bravo!"

"Shi, can you reach the keys?" Conan asked.

Shi got up and grabbed them. "With pleasure." She unlocked first the Doctor, then Saguru and Ace.

The Doctor slapped Ace's cheeks lightly. "Come on Ace. Wake up."

Ace groaned. "Ugh... Hi Professor."

The Doctor grinned. "Hello Ace."

Meanwhile Shi had woken Saguru up. "What happened?" she asked him.

Saguru rubbed his head. "They hit me from behind with something."

The Doctor nodded. "Same with us. Now let's get out of here before the Big Bad Butcher wakes up."

Saguru glanced at the unconscious Dihaclyd, grimacing. "I'd hate to be in the stomach of that thing."

"Let's _go_." Shi said impatiently.

Together the five of them started wandering the ship trying to find a way out. "So Professor, who're your friends?"

The Doctor grinned. "Oh! Ace, this is Saguru, Conan, and, uh, Shi," he said at a glare from Shi. "Saguru, Shi, and Conan, this is Ace."

"I see. Nice to meet you all. So Professor, after you wandered off to fight a war, you just picked more people up, even though _you promised that if you were still alive you'd come get me_!" Ace slapped him.

"Ow... I might've deserved that."

"Might've? _Might've_? You never came back! You said you would and you didn't! You said you had gone to war! I'd thought you'd died! And damn it Professor, you didn't exactly leave me in the friendliest place either!"

The Doctor was confused. "But if I didn't leave you in the friendliest place ever, how did you get here?"

Ace rolled her eyes and got a sadistic look on her face. "I met a Time Agent in a bar. We had a few drinks together, things led to more things, and I slipped him a sleeping pill. Nicked his ship right out from under him. Literally. Poor guy was sleeping on top of it."

"Ace..." the Doctor reproached.

"Hey, he deserved it. Mentioned something about thinking of turning into a con artist. A con artist with a time machine, now there's a scary idea."

"Ace..." the Doctor said in awe.

"Can we leave the angry ex argument for after we escape?" Shi asked.

Ace and the Doctor both looked sheepish. "Oh, right. Sorry," the Doctor said. "Exit's this way thereabouts."

Fifteen minutes and several wrong turns later, they had made it to the sunlight. Saguru shaded his eyes as he looked at the hulking monstrosity of a ship. "So now what do we do about the aliens?"

A second door, invisible from the outside, opened and out stepped a Dihaclyd of obvious authority. "I think we're about to find out," the Doctor stated.

The Dihaclyd approached the group and pointed at the Doctor. "You are the leader?"

"Leader of what?" the Doctor queried.

"Leader of Earth?"

"Earth? Oh no, Earth doesn't have a leader. Though I have on occasion served as Earth's Champion."

The Dihaclyd nodded. "Good. Tell your people that they do not suit our palate and that they have no more to fear from us."

The Dihaclyd turned and stepped back into his ship. The doors closed and thrusters fired, sending the ship flying off into space.

"Well that was... a bit undramatic," the Doctor finally commented.

Conan blinked several times. "I, ah... I should be getting home."

The Doctor nodded, serious. "Yes you should. We can't have you getting into any more extraterrestrial trouble until after you defeat the Black Organization. Or die trying, but it's the thought that counts."

Conan caught Shi's eyes. They each nodded, acknowledging each other. Conan knew who she was, and supposed he now felt like what Ran did whenever she was particularly convinced he was Shinichi. "Goodbye then. Maybe I'll meet all of you again."

The Doctor nodded again. "Maybe you will."

Conan parted ways from the group as they walked back in the direction of the TARDIS. As he walked he heard Saguru ask, "Edogawa Conan knows about the Black Organization?" Perhaps he would have to ask him about that next time they met.

Instead of going to Mouri's Detective Agency, he headed for Agasa's instead. Entering the house, he called out. "Professor!" He heard some strange sort of mechanical grinding noise. Frowning, he entered the living room on the way to the lab and saw Ai sitting on the couch flipping through a fashion magazine.

"What's that look for?" she asked him.

He blinked several times, then shook his head rapidly. All of a sudden it seemed wrong to see her this size. "You won't believe what happened at the park today."

"Try me."

Conan and Ai stared at each other for several moments. Finally Conan looked away. "Nah. Better not. Time is weird." He then ambled off in the direction of the lab.

Because he wouldn't want to accidentally give out a self-fulfilling prophecy. Those things tend to be bad.

* * *

**This end, of course, matches up with the end of Time/Space/Shiho wonderfully.**

**Reviews please!**


	5. The Year That Never Was

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and the Year That Never Was**

**Summary: Martha's running loose, the Doctor and Saguru have been captured, and the Master may have just the thing to make himself truly immortal: two not-children by the names of Shiho and Shinichi.**

**Disclaimer: I couldn't really care less right now, butr what do you know? It's something else I don't own.**

**Am having such a bad day, and on vacation too. With the new age of cell phones and email, bad news can reach you anywhere! Especially of the "Your school is trying to fuck you over by giving you shitty classes and not giving you a single one you want again!" variety.**

**That and I just suck.**

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The cold metal of a gun barrel pressed hard against his scalp. It was a feeling he had felt before, but never one that he would get used to. Martha Jones glanced around, panicked, helpless. He knew that look well. It was the look of one whose morals wouldn't possibly let them save themself. He smiled bitterly. _Do what you have to do_.

At the tiniest of nods from the Doctor, Martha Jones disappeared.

The Master spun around, his attention reengaged. "Oh pity. It appears I've lost one. Oh well. I've still got my favorite two toys. And a third toy to rot in the bottom of the toy box, but we can't love all our toys now can we?"

Jack grimaced as the Master gave him a whack with a foot as he passed. The Master reached Saguru and knelt, reaching a hand into Saguru's pocket. He pulled out Saguru's prized fob watch, breaking the chain with a yank. The Master admired the griffon design on the front. "Nice watch."

"Give that back," Saguru hissed.

The Master sighed dramatically, slipping the pocket watch into his own pocket. "So troublesome. Stick him in a cell until I can find the proper leverage. After all, a toy is no fun without batteries."

* * *

It took the Master two weeks to figure out why he was keeping Saguru around. Two weeks of wondering if Martha was still alive. Two weeks of hearing Jack's agonized screams from just down the hall. Two weeks of knowing that the Doctor was feeling guilty mental agony for what was going on.

Two weeks of worrying about his friends, family, and acquaintances down on the surface below. Two weeks later, he wished he didn't know.

The Master swirled in, all blood-red roses and evil laughs. A child-sized lump was held on either shoulder, each clearly unconscious. Saguru felt a dark feeling settle in the pit of his stomach.

The one over the left shoulder was pulled off and dumped on the ground unceremoniously. Short dirty blond hair nearly covered the face of a dirty young girl dressed in a reddish-brown coat. Saguru got the sickening feeling that that wasn't the coat's original color.

"Guess what Saggy Saguru, I found your favorite cousin! Shitty Shiho! Oh, but look, it seems she's a bit small. Oh well. But guess what? Look who else is a bit small!" The other child slumped to the floor. This one was a boy with black hair and a nasty looking cut on his arm. Edogawa Conan, the strange boy who played detective with skill unusual for his age. "There's _two_ of them!" the Master exclaimed, overjoyed. "And guess what that means? It means I can compare their DNA and see which strands are identical, and from there on out narrow down the bits that give them their shrinking ability! I'm so clever, I could be immortal twice over!"

The Master picked the two not-children up and made to leave. "Oh by the way," he said as an afterthought. "You're no longer a toy. You're a battery."

* * *

Saguru was allowed very little time without the Master with either Shiho or Edogawa. And even when he was, most of the time someone wasn't conscious. But in those few moments that they did have to discuss things over, he didn't like the picture he was getting.

Tokyo, being one of the most densely populated areas in the world, had been hit hard by the Toclafane. And it seemed that a few smart ones had figured out what a police station was, and what threat it posed to them. Shiho and Conan had been there when it happened.

Their words painted a horror in blood. Guns had been loaded, bullets fired, but it was no use. It seemed that a children's club, the Detective Boys, were giving a report on a murder they had found at the time. It was their blood that Shiho's coat had been dyed in. Conan had found himself separated from them and in the company of… and Saguru's heart was horrified to hear… two teenagers, Kuroba Kaito and Nakamori Aoko. They had hidden in a store cupboard, but Aoko's soft weeping for her father had given them away. Fleeing down the hallway, Aoko had slipped on a patch of spilt blood and… and Conan and Kaito had had to escape without her.

For two days Conan and Kaito had stayed together, hiding amongst debris and carnage. Then overnight Kaito disappeared, leaving Conan a note stating that the Toclafane were hunting him for reasons he could not divulge and was best alone. Conan had smiled bitterly and told Saguru that he already had Kaito figured. From there Conan had found Ai in the sewers. She had been tipped off that the Master was looking for her and together they tried to get a boat off of Japan, but they were given away and hunted down quickly.

The Master experimented ruthlessly on Shiho and Conan, occasionally even pulling Saguru into the mix. While as a Time Lord he had his regenerations, he still wanted to be as immortal as he possibly could. His regenerations plus a fountain of youth was his overall goal, though he still delighted in causing them unnecessary pain.

* * *

It was six months into hell when the Master strode angrily into the laboratory. He leveled a gun straight at Saguru's forehead. "Give me one reason I shouldn't."

Saguru had no idea why he was so angry and so couldn't really. Conan smirked. "Having a bad day are we?"

"Shut your mouth boy!" the Master shouted. He turned his rage back to Saguru. "You'll never guess what happened today. In a flash of red light, two people appeared on this ship. You know both of them. They snatched your beloved cousin right from under my very nose and left. Left me with nothing!" He kicked over a tray covered in instruments. "Some day, some day very soon, I will come in here with heads. They will be the heads of Kaito Kuroba, Akako Koizumi, and our very own Shiho Miyano!" And with that vow, he left as quickly as he came.

Saguru had to chuckle. "Kuroba and Koizumi? The universe will end before he catches them." And he even knew how long that would be.

* * *

Saguru had no idea where the Doctor was at the moment, but he suspected it had something to do with reports of a bonfire in the woods. He had been with Martha and her family for a while, but Martha had sensed his wish to leave and shoved him out the door. As for Conan, he was probably still in the TARDIS getting his head on straight. That and not messing with the space-time continuum. The fact that he was on Earth when the paradox had started and on the Valiant when the paradox had ended resulted in there being two Conans: one who was still in Japan and had no idea what had happened, and another who had been on the Valiant for a year and could now go nowhere near his other self for fear of causing another paradox. Which meant he was kind of stuck with the Doctor, Martha, and Saguru.

But Saguru wasn't going back to the TARDIS. Instead he was raising his hand to ring the doorbell of a nondescript London apartment.

It wasn't long before a woman with short blond hair and reading glasses perched precariously on her nose opened the door. "Saguru!"

The jump she made caused the glasses to fall, but Saguru caught them with long skill. He handed them back to her. "Hey Mum."

And as his mother herded him into the apartment he had grown up in, yammering about how angry his foolish father was that he had disappeared, and how worried she had been, and how much he had grown, he thought that life was good.

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**Murder throttle kill school. Every year. Every year my schedule looks like something the cat dragged in. Every year on the eve of the first day I have a nightmare where everything goes to hell. And every year it does, and every year it's all I can do to keep from drowning in the stupidity of it all.**


	6. Time and Space and Ran

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and Ran**

**Summary: Once upon a time, Ran followed Shinichi. And once upon a time, Ran kicked Gin in the face. And once upon a time, Ran paid for her indiscretion against the Organization. Amazing who you'll run into in Pete's World.**

**Pairing: ShinRan**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Detective Conan or Doctor Who.**

**This is AU, of a sort. An AU that is provided for in canon. That is, an AU for one canon that is provided for in another canon. Like all my Doctor Who/Detective Conan fics, this works as a standalone (hence its own fic), but some things may make more sense or just be funnier if you've read one of the others. I would tell you which fic ties in with this one now, but that would give away the end.**

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She followed him.

She has no idea why she followed him. Her shoelace broke, almost like an omen, but she quickly knotted it and followed him all the same.

She wonders what would have happened if she hadn't.

But she sees him there taking pictures, knowing that he wouldn't be doing so without a reason. And she sees the tall blond one sneak up behind him. And that doesn't sit right with her. That's _her_ Shinichi being snuck up on.

So she does something about it. She kicks the blond in the face.

Shinichi spins around, surprised to see her. She ignores him in favor of beating the blond up more. But he's strong, stronger than her, and it is that which sends her flying. Her head slams against the wall of the building, and she sees stars.

She cries out. But Shinichi is too busy fighting off the other one to notice. The blond one forces something down her throat, and her body erupts into pain. Blissfully, she blacks out.

When she comes to again, Shinichi is carrying her. He's running as fast as he can down back alleys and side streets. And there's something different. He's bigger than he should be. He notices that she's conscious again. "Hang on, Ran," he assures. "We'll go to Professor Agasa's and get help."

She is content to fall asleep in his arms again, sure that he will make everything all right.

When she awakens again, she is on Professor Agasa's couch. But the same skewed perspective she felt earlier is still there. She hears muffled voices coming from the kitchen. She pulls the blanket that has been draped over off and rolls off of the couch.

That's when she realizes something is more than a little not right. The couch is too high, the door too far, and her clothes too big. A slight scream is all it takes to bring Shinichi running. He hugs her tight, whispering soothing words, but none of them penetrate the panic she feels. Everything is too big… she is too small.

That is when the house next door blows up. Shinichi's house.

Shinichi's eyes grow wide, and some harried words are tossed between the three people. They've followed them, even though Shinichi tried to lose them. They're on the hit list of a criminal organization now. There's no way they'll survive this.

Professor Agasa manages to find some children's clothes somewhere. Ran dresses quickly as Shinichi books the next flight out of Japan. Ever helpful, the Professor locates Ran's old passport that she lost there ten years ago.

Sad farewells are said. It hadn't yet been fifteen minutes since Ran woke up.

Shinichi is carrying Ran again. They run all the way to the airport. They board the plane, hoping no one notices any inconsistencies. None are noticed, and soon they are in flight. Shinichi and Ran celebrate getting away for the time being, and start wondering what they're going to do next.

All their plans turn out for naught. They are closing in on London when the plane's nose suddenly dips. People scream. There is the terrible sound of ripping metal. The plane jolts, bends, and snaps in its impromptu landing.

When it is all over, Ran finds a jagged piece of metal penetrating her arm. It hurts, but what hurts more is the fact that the seat next to her is not merely empty; it is half gone. Ripped away with the wing, only half of it remained and Shinichi was gone. Panic fills Ran's mind, and it is that panic that allows her to work herself free and search the wreckage, ignoring the dead around her.

She finds him, finally, trapped under one of the jet engines. He is not moving; there is a pool of a dark substance around him. She runs toward him, crying out his name. His eyes slit open, and his voice rasps out her name. "Ran…"

"I'm here… Shinichi, I'm here!"

He smiles softly, painfully. "Good. You need to get away. They'll be back. Find safe place. Don't die. Love you."

Then he reaches up with his free hand and pulls her down. And it is unlike she ever imagined kissing him would be. It is fierce, it is desperate, it is urgent.

And then he goes limp.

This is the story, edited for brevity, that she tells the Tylers when she stumbles upon their house. And they believe her. They take her in and give her a new identity and tell her that they can never find her again.

But something is missing. She tries to forget about it, but she can't. Shinichi is missing. Shinichi is gone. In order to keep her mind off of it, she gets involved in the Tyler family business: aliens. And she learns that the Tyler daughter, only a few years older than Ran really is, is involved with the aliens for much the same reason. Because she's actually from a parallel world, and is in love with an alien who time travels.

Ran does the polite thing and gives her the benefit of the doubt. After all, that's what they gave her. And Rose Tyler is no ordinary person. Coming from her, Ran actually finds herself believing. And helping Rose with her dimension cannon. And one day they get it to work. One day shortly after defending the Earth from a race of aliens known as Daleks who will be giving Ran nightmares for months.

Rose takes it as a sign, and vanishes into thin air. Jackie and Mickey quickly follow suit. They're gone for several days, during which Ran is reminded of her days cleaning up after her father even though Pete Tyler is hardly a drunk. Then out of the blue, Pete's phone rings. It's Jackie. She and Rose need picking up, Mickey stayed behind, and they've got two new houseguests. So Pete grabs Ran and Tony and away they flee to Bad Wolf Bay, Norway.

And she can't believe her eyes. It's him.

He's small like her, and oversized glasses perch on his nose. But it's him, and she hasn't seen him in years it seems like, and… it's him.

"He's a double of the Shinichi in the other world," a man, who Ran would later learn to be the Doctor, says. "There was this big paradox mess and when the dust cleared there were two Shinichis."

"He couldn't just live on Earth anymore for fear of causing another paradox," Rose continued. "I figured that since the Shinichi in this world is dead, he could come here. I hope you don't mind too much Ran."

Ran finds that she doesn't mind. Not a bit.

Conan (as he is insisting on going by that stupid false name out of paranoid fear) couldn't care less either.

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**If you want the long version of why there's another Conan, the tie-in is with Time/Space/Year That Never Was. If you want the short version... it's pretty much right there. Conan was on Earth when the paradox started and on the Valiant when it ended and so time reversed everywhere but the Valiant and so there were two Conans.**

**The AU is that Ran followed Shinichi. The provided-for bit is Pete's World. Makes sense now, eh? Reviews please!**


	7. Time and Space and a Heist

**Yo! I've decided that this is just getting out of hand and so am combining all of the Time and Space 'verse (yay! my own 'verse!) stories here. Unless I come up with one long demented plot that's chapter-spanning that is.**

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**Time and Space and a Heist**

**Summary: There's a heist in Osaka, Heiji's got a headache, Conan is along for the ride, and the Doctor just happens to have an errand to run in the area. Lots of people are hung upside down in storage closets, and Kid is interrogated by a time traveler.**

**Disclaimer: Je n'est pas owner of Detective Conan, Magic Kaito, or Doctor Who.**

**I had SO much fun with this one. It gave me some trouble at first, but once I figured out what I was doing, it really flowed. So what do you get when you get a crazy thief and a crazy time traveler on a roof together? This.**

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Saguru hated ropes.

And ever since he met Kaito Kid, he hated them even more.

Since meeting the Doctor, he was coming close to declaring them his mortal enemy.

And since this particular rope was the result of both of them (the Doctor not showing up when he said he would, Kaito Kid showing up instead), he was this close to attempting to make the rope disappear out of shame of the profanities it was producing. To make matters worse, the Swiss army knife he had taken to storing in his boot was out of reach.

Right about then was when his pocket watch slipped out of his pocket and started dangling somewhere around his mid-torso. He glared at the knife on the floor, it having also slipped out of its storage spot.

Blood rushing to his head, he couldn't help but hate the world.

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Hattori Heiji was having a very bad day. And it had started out so well too.

To start out with, there was a heist in Osaka. This was nice, because there were practically never any heists in Osaka, and he wasn't allowed to specially miss school to go to a heist in Tokyo. Heists were nice. Heists were fun, because nobody ever died. Usually. It was like Kaito Kid had a negative effect on the bodies-dropping-out-of-the-sky syndrome he usually got whenever Kudo was around.

Heiji briefly wondered if that said something about the thief, then decided it was just coincidence.

Then Kudo himself had shown up, with Ran-chan and unfortunately Detective Mouri in tow. That was when it started to go downhill.

First Heiji developed a killer headache. Ran-chan offered him some aspirin she had in her bag, but he had unfortunately had to decline as he was allergic to it. He said as much, and Ran-chan sent him a pitying look. Undoubtedly her head produced many aches between worrying about Kudo, looking after her dad, and taking care of Conan.

Then, almost as if the headache was prophetic, not too long after that Heiji's least-favorite detective showed up. Considering that he had heard a rumor that Hakuba Saguru had been reported missing, this was just not fair. So, cutting his losses, he had grabbed Kudo and split, hoping to plot ways to catch Kid without the British detective hovering nearby.

This had not worked nearly as well as he'd thought it would. First off, it turned out it was harder to lose Hakuba than he'd previously thought possible. The other detective was always right around the corner listening to everything they were saying, and then vanishing whenever he looked. He had definitely become sneakier as of late. So when Heiji whispered his idea in Kudo's ear, Kudo had verified it for him: Hakuba had indeed been reported missing. The two of them had a 'are you thinking what I'm thinking of?' moment and then pounced on Hakuba.

Unfortunately, the Hakuba/Kid theory did not follow through. At all. Kudo had had the gall to suggest that they work with Hakuba since he knew the most about Kid, but Heiji shot him down on that. This was Osaka, and so they were going to do this his way. He could have sworn he heard Kudo sigh the sigh of the long-sufferer, but he ignored it. They continued to try and stay away from Hakuba, without much luck. If Heiji didn't know better, he would think that Kid himself had been teaching Hakuba to sneak around.

And then there was reason number two that sneaking off wasn't working as well as he'd thought it would. His killer headache was so bad that he could hardly pay attention to what Kudo was saying, let alone help him plot. The crowning moment of glory had to be when he sat down on the floor and leaned against the pedestal atop which the Loup le Lapis sat, wishing that his headache would just go away while Kaito Kid sauntered past and took the jewel. Then Inspector Nakamori, noticing said lack of gemstone while Heiji was completely clueless, decided that Heiji must be Kid and thus pounced on him.

Heiji sometimes wondered why Kid always got away. Not now. Now he just wanted to go home and forget today ever happened.

* * *

Edogawa Conan really just wanted to talk to Hakuba Saguru, alone. However, as par the course, Fate had something different in mind.

Ever since that chance meeting in the park (which Conan didn't want to think too hard about, lest the worldly laws as he knew them be shattered into a million pieces), he had been eager to corner the blond and interrogate him on what he knew about the Black Organization. That chance overheard comment had left him scrambling for information on Hakuba's whereabouts, but he was quick to dismay when he found out that the British detective was tentatively labeled missing. On questioning, Inspector Nakamori had revealed a wealth of places Hakuba could be, from the mundane and familiar ("He probably got a call for an interesting case and went gallivanting off without telling anyone") to the drastic and distressingly familiar ("Of course, there's always the possibility that he ended up on the wrong side of someone and they kidnapped him or something"). In the end Inspector Nakamori had admitted to having no clue where Hakuba Saguru was, and Conan was back at square one.

Running into Hakuba Saguru at that heist in Osaka had been one of the best things that had happened to him all week. Unfortunately this was ruined by Hattori, whose headache was making his already tense relations with the British detective even worse. 'Testy' was not a word Conan would usually use to describe Hattori, but it certainly seemed to fit now. Conan found himself guiltily pleased when Hattori pleaded off thinking in favor of sitting down somewhere. Unfortunately by that time Hakuba had vanished off to places unknown, and Conan was left looking all over the museum.

He had thought his big break had come when a security guard had told him that if he was looking for Hakuba, he could be found hanging upside down in a storage closet. Preoccupied, he had almost thanked the guard before he realized what was going on. Unfortunately by the time he got his head on straight, it was back off as Kid the guard had thrown down a sleeping gas pellet.

When Conan came to, he was dangling upside down in what appeared to be a storage closet. Unfortunately, it seemed to be a different one than Hakuba's.

* * *

He really did feel sort of bad doing that to poor Hattori. The Osakan detective hadn't looked like he was doing too well. But he was there, and it was the perfect setup, and he had always wanted to try just walking by and palming the target of the night. He was still giddy about getting away with it so cleanly.

He was also giddy about Nakamori taking so long to accost Hattori's cheeks that it was a rather leisurely walk up the stairs to the roof. And since Hakuba had been there, he wasn't particularly surprised that the strange man who called himself the Doctor was waiting there for him. "Beautiful night, isn't it?"

The Doctor turned his head to look at him, a grin on his face. "Oh yes, isn't it? But what you should really see is the night sky on Cassifly 4. The atmosphere gives the night sky a deep purple hue, and the stars are so dense they're like glitter."

Kid shrugged, smiling that all-knowing smile of his and joining the Doctor on the edge of the building. "I'm not even going to try to ask you to explain that."

The Doctor nodded. "Good choice. Explanations take the magic out of everything."

A large lapis lazuli pendant in the shape of a wolf appeared in Kid's hand, and was held to the moonlight. "And how many moons does this place you're talking about have?"

"Seven," the Doctor answered. "The locals plan their calendar by it. Once a month the moons align to form their own little constellation, and they have a festival."

"I'd love to see it," Kid commented. "Not you," he muttered as the stone failed to glow red. It was slipped back into his pocket.

"So what is the name of this heist anyway?"

"Loup le Lapis. It's French. The guy who named it probably thought he was being clever. Or maybe curses just need silly names. Some people certainly think it's cursed. Good people gain possession of it, and all of a sudden they're embezzling politicians or head of the mafia. The common belief is that the stone turns them to evil." The pendant appeared again so that the carving could be admired. "This is one bad wolf."

Beside him, the Doctor froze. "What did you just say?"

Poker Face didn't slip, although Kid was curious. "That this stone is a bad wolf?"

The Doctor spun towards him suddenly, an arm grabbing Kid's shoulder and a crazed look in the time traveler's eyes. "_Why _did you just say that?"

Kid shrugged, wondering why this information could possibly be so important. "Some people just call it that. I guess because it's in the shape of a wolf and is rumored to tempt people to evil."

"That's it? Nothing else? You know absolutely nothing else about it?"

"No. Sorry I can't help you. Why is it so important? What's so special about a stone called Bad Wolf?"

"It's not the stone," the Doctor responded darkly. "It's the name. Bad Wolf is the name of a god-like being who likes to leave its name lying around in important places. In essence it's a message… a message to me, warning of something to come. I thought it…" His voice caught, causing him to pause. "I thought she was gone for good."

Kid held out the stone. "Do you want it, just in case it's significant?"

The Doctor shook his head, but pulled out his sonic screwdriver. "Nah, I'll just check it to make sure it's just a lapis lazuli wolf carving, as currently believed." Silently, Kid handed him the pendant. The sonic screwdriver buzzed, and the Doctor handed it back. "It's clean. Completely curseless. Safe to give back to Inspector Nakamori, or whoever really."

Kid nodded. "Good."

"Well, I'd best get going then," the Doctor said, turning to leave.

"Wait."

The Doctor stopped.

"You said that 'Bad Wolf' is a warning. Now I don't know what sort of trouble we're talking about, but warnings do usually mean trouble. And I'm not so bold as to call Hakuba a friend, but he is mine. You'd better keep him safe for me."

The Doctor smiled. "Of course. I'll be seeing you around."

"You'd better be. Oh, by the way, Hakuba is in a storage closet in the left wing of the third floor. He may be a little miffed when you let him out."

"Should I tell him how much you care about him?"

"Nah. Then he might start getting conflicting ideas about justice, and that would probably break his brain. Best not to. We wouldn't want him pulling an Inspector Javert now would we?"

"No. We most certainly do not."

The sound of boots thumping up the stairwell reached their ears. A hang-glider popped from Kid's cape as he prepared to take off. "Well, I'm afraid our conversation is over. Farewell, mon compatriot."

"Your compatriot in what exactly?"

"Trouble?" Kid offered. "I don't know, you tell me."

A jump and a whoosh, and he was gone.

The Doctor smiled and waved at the retreating white shape as Inspector Nakamori and Company barged on to the rooftop. Kid would be all right. And maybe when this was all over, he could take Kaito to Cassifly 4.

* * *

**HAH! I bet you did **_**not **_** see that coming! See, there are vague story arcs going on. Enough so that I'm wondering if I should post all of these as just one story. But the problem is, nothing's in order, so I dunno. Plus I'd lose the reviews on the first three. Why do the last two have no reviews? Are they unlikeable? If so, please tell me. I like to know what you think.**

**The reference Kaito makes to Hakuba pulling an Inspector Javert is a reference to the musical Les Mis. Inspector Javert is a police inspector who spends his life chasing Jean Valjean, who got caught stealing a loaf of bread and then broke his parole. After Valjean saves his life, Javert starts questioning right and wrong and ends up throwing himself into the Seine. This is something we really don't want Hakuba to do. For one thing, he would be paying for a ticket to France and then not enjoying it.**


	8. Heiji's Harrowing Spaceship Experience

**Heiji's Harrowing Spaceship Experience**

**Timeframe: Between Last of the Time Lords and Partners in Crime.**

**Summary: Heiji is kidnapped by aliens who want to ransom him for the world's oil supplies. They're rather dumb aliens.**

**Disclaimer: Doctor Who and Detective Conan no belongy to me-y.**

**This one's rather long. I woke up this morning with a plunnie gnawing on me and it's now 4:30. I've been writing it practically nonstop. Maybe that's why I don't quite feel like everybody's in character. I mean, Conan has an excuse to be bitter, and Heiji gets pretty badass at the end, but other than that it feels off. Please tell me what you think.

* * *

**

"When was the last time you were in Osaka, Saguru?"

Saguru took a break from admiring Osaka Castle to answer the Doctor. "You mean other than when I was recently locked in a closet?"

The Doctor sheepishly scratched the back of his neck. "Uhh, yeah."

"When I was five, I believe. Usually when I visited my father when I was little we just stayed in Tokyo, but that time he had been bogged down with work and didn't have any time for me anyway. So Baaya took me here to see the sights."

The Doctor grinned at that. "I thought so. You're acting like you've never seen it before."

Saguru glared. "Hey, I'm allowed to be awed by normal things just like everybody else."

"Just don't keep talking like that in front of Conan, he'll get jealous."

"He's seen Osaka Castle before," Saguru shot back, "and much more recently than me, oh ye who insists on parking in large closets. Why was it that you insisted he stay in the TARDIS again? Because you didn't want to run into the other Conan, or because you didn't want to fall prey to the Detectives' Curse?"

"Oi!" the Doctor protested. "He's a walking paradox and you know it!" He then added, as an afterthought, "Though the lack of dead people is a plus."

Saguru smiled to himself as he looked back to Osaka Castle. He used to be like that too, with dead bodies left and right, but after he had started chasing Kid it had mostly stopped. While off Earth Conan's curse was somewhat muted, but dead people still showed up about a third of the time they were on Earth.

"Hakuba-niisan!"

Saguru turned around. Speak of the devil… or one of them, anyway. Conan Prime as it were, who had no idea that he had a double running around all of time and space. "Conan-kun," he answered back. "What are you doing in Osaka?"

"I'm visiting Heiji-niichan!" the kid piped. Saguru was reminded how Conan could possibly go this long without being outed as Kudo Shinichi. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, just looking around," Saguru answered, making a vague sweep with his arm at nothing in particular.

And then suddenly the little kid aura was gone. "Hakuba-niisan, I need to ask you a few questions about-"

Conan was thankfully cut off by a loud buzzing sound, seemingly emanating from everything with a screen in the area. Saguru and the Doctor ran over to the front window of a nearby electronics store, Conan following after them. All of the TVs in the window had suddenly lost their picture, becoming the buzzing black and white dots indicating a lack of signal. Then the buzzing faded and the picture cleared, but it was not what had been showing before. It was an alien, with leathery brown skin and a long, skinny trunk. Behind the alien swished a long tail, and long skinny arms held a space gun to a certain dark-skinned Osakan.

"Heiji-niichan!" Conan exclaimed.

"Lhisthen closehly, humans," the alien said in a high-pitched voice, Hs showing up where they weren't supposed to be. "Hi have this bhoy hat guhunpohint. Hi whill khill him hif whe do nhot rheceive hyour wohrld's hoil suhpplihes. Hyou have twhenty-fhour hours tho hassemble the hoil." The TVs buzzed again, then returned to their normal programs.

Conan blinked several times. "Waaiit… what?"

Saguru refrained from smacking his forehead, "Those are some dumb aliens."

The Doctor nodded. "Yes, the Tesorians. They're not the brightest bulbs in the universe, no. But they're having a slight oil shortage back on their home planet, which is making them a bit desperate. Come on, Saguru. Let's deal with this."

"Right-o, Doctor," Saguru replied, chasing after him in the direction of the TARDIS.

"But… wait…" Conan said ineffectively, feeling very confused.

* * *

Conan looked up from the book he was reading on the control room seat. "Back already? That was fast," he said in a voice that indicated anything other than surprise.

"Oh stop being such a wet blanket," the Doctor said as he made a beeline for the controls. "Aliens are holding someone hostage for the world's oil-"

"Which is never going to work," Saguru cut in.

"-And you know him," the Doctor finished.

Conan bookmarked his spot and set the book down, jumping off the seat and becoming slightly curious. "Oh really? Who?"

"Let's put it this way," Saguru said. "We're going to step out onto that ship and every single alien on it will immediately die of murder."

Conan glared at Saguru as the Doctor set the TARDIS in motion. Conan's glare disappeared as both he and Saguru were knocked off their feet. "You could give us some warning you know," Saguru protested.

"You knew what I was going to do! That's warning enough!"

With one last shudder, the TARDIS landed. "So? Where are we?" Conan asked

"On a spaceship orbiting Earth," the Doctor answered. "There's no way Earth will give up its oil for one measly life, so we're going to rescue Hattori Heiji before they kill him."

Much to the Doctor's surprise, Conan burst into laughter at this. "Hattori's been kidnapped by aliens," he stated once he'd finally gotten control of his laughter. "Hattori's been kidnapped by aliens, and we're going to rescue him. That's one of the best things I've heard in a while."

The Doctor and Saguru shared a look. Maybe they should let him out more. It sounded like he was going a bit stir crazy.

"So," Conan said, "What's the plan?"

"We're going to rescue him," the Doctor said. "Rescue him, convince the aliens to leave, and bring him back to Earth on the TARDIS."

"I do not like that plan," Conan replied, deadpanning.

"Really?" the Doctor asked, confused. "What about it don't you like?"

"The 'bring him back to Earth on the TARDIS' part. Aren't I supposed to be staying away from them or something?"

"It's only if you meet yourself that the universe collapses," the Doctor assured unhelpfully. "You just need to convince Heiji not to mention you to yourself. Or if you really wanted you could just hide in the depths of the TARDIS. So," he said, heading for the door, "Are you coming or not?"

Conan held up the palms of his hands. "I'll pass, thank you very much."

The Doctor shrugged. "Okay then. Come along Saguru, allons-y!"

And so, leaving Conan behind, the two of them left the TARDIS to find themselves in… "A storage closet," Saguru said, less than impressed.

"Oi!" the Doctor protested. "Storage closets are wonderful places to land!"

Saguru tried to open the door to the storage closet. "Not when they're locked from the outside," he replied.

"Move." A buzz from the sonic screwdriver and the door opened. "There. Happy now?"

Saguru pushed the door open the rest of the way and exited the closet. "Yes, very."

The Doctor looked around the dark hallway that they had ended up in. "Oh why does nobody ever light their spaceships properly?" he complained. "Anyway, Tesorian ship, so the control room must be that way."

Saguru followed the Doctor as they headed in the same general direction, but every once and a while made a turn. "Are you sure we're going the right way?" he asked after a while.

"Of course," the Doctor replied. "Tesorian ships are notorious for their predictability."

"And why are we going to the control room?" Saguru asked. "Doesn't the sonic screwdriver have a detect humans setting on it or something?"

The Doctor looked sheepish. "Well, yes it does, but I've sort of ran into the Tesorians before. They sort of know that I tend to show up on Earth, and they sort of know that I can use the sonic screwdriver to detect humans. It comes in very handy, unless there's a dampening field in place."

"Ah," Saguru said, nodding. That actually made sense.

Then there was a clanking noise. And some shouting. And running. And someone carrying a large metal pipe running into Saguru. That someone was Hattori, who had knocked them both down. Hattori took no time showing surprise. "Hakuba, what the hell're you doin' here?"

Saguru stood back up, dusting himself off as he did so. "I, unfortunately, am here to rescue you."

"Were you at gunpoint or something?" Heiji asked sarcastically.

"I thought you were," Saguru shot back. "What are you doing here without an entourage?"

Heiji shrugged. "Eh, they were distracted by some guy in a red beret threatening to blow them out of the sky or something."

The Doctor immediately butted in, deadly serious. "Red berets? Did they say they were from UNIT?"

Heiji nodded. "Yeah, they mentioned that."

The Doctor held out his hand. "Saguru, phone." Saguru complied, and the Doctor punched in a number.

_"Hello, this is the Unified Intelligence Taskforce Headquarters. For the Human Resources department, press…"_

"Bloody useless this is!" the Doctor nearly shouted at the phone. "I need a direct line to the Brigadier is what I need!"

"Tuhrn hoff hyour cohmmhunhication dhevhice himmedhiatehly!"

The two humans and one Time Lord looked away from the cell phone and towards the Tesorian who had issued the command. There were six of them all total, each one carrying a blaster of some kind. The Doctor pulled the phone from his ear and stopped the call, slipping it into his pocket.

"Nhow," the Tesorian stated, "Hyou whill come whith hus. Hand hyou whill drhop the pihpe."

Heiji let the pipe clatter to the floor, and the three of them let themselves be marched off. After a quick walk, they found themselves in the control room of the ship. Out the front window, Earth loomed close. Or to be more specific, East Asia. They were orbiting rather close. One of the aliens turned around as they entered. "Hah," he said as he saw them. "Hyou have capthured the hostage hand fhound the hintruders hat the sahme tihme. Hi ham Cahptahin Hyahyahoh. Whelcome to mhy ship."

"You talk funny," Heiji said.

"You're one to talk," Saguru shot in.

"No bickering you two," the Doctor ordered. He then stood forward. "So you're the one in charge of this operation! I heard rumors that UNIT was threatening to blow you up, is that true?"

"Hyes, that his," Captain Hyahyahoh confirmed. "Bhut whe hare cerhthain that they hare blhuffhing."

Saguru and Heiji exchanged a glanced. The Doctor spoke on. "Um, sorry to disillusion you Captain, but… they're not."

Captain Hyahyahoh glared. "Whe shahll seeh."

At that precise moment, one of the other Tesorians shouted, "Cahptahin! Hi ham pihckhing hup two rhockhets heading hour whay!"

Captain Hyahyahoh spun towards the crewman. "What?" At that moment the ship rocked violently. "Hevehrybodhy, habandhon ship!"

The Tesorians abandoned their posts as fast as they could, sprinting for the door to the hallway. The Doctor, Heiji, and Saguru could only spin around in confusion. Then the ship rocked a second time, and there was an explosion. Suddenly the hallway was gone, and in its place was the gaping void of space.

"Grab on to something!" the Doctor shouted, throwing his own arm around a console strut.

Saguru obeyed, twisting around a skinny column near the doorway, the air rushing past his ears. But Heiji wasn't so lucky. He would've flown past Saguru into the abyss if Saguru hadn't thrown out his hand and grabbed the Osakan's. Even still the pull was great, and Saguru could feel their hands slipping.

"I can close the door from here," the Doctor shouted, "but first you have to clear it! Get out of the way Heiji!"

"Come on!" Saguru shouted.

Heiji reached forward with his other hand and managed to grab onto Saguru's wrist with it. It felt like it took hours for him to work his way up Saguru's arm when it really only took seconds. Finally he managed to hook his foot around the column. "I'm clear!"

The Doctor reached up and slammed down on a button. The door to the hallway slid shut with a clang, and air returned to normal. Saguru and Heiji let go of the pole, Saguru sighing in relief. "That was close."

"Don't celebrate yet," the Doctor warned. "After two hits like that, there's no way this thing is still going to fly."

Heiji glanced out the front window. The Doctor was right. Slowly but surely, Earth was getting closer.

"Well then we'll just have to get to the TARDIS," Saguru stated. At the Doctor's forlorn expression he faltered. "Don't tell me…"

"That was the only way out of here," the Doctor replied. "We're trapped."

Heiji sat down at one of the control centers. "Well if we can't fly this, we can crash it, right?"

Saguru snorted. "We are hurtling through Earth's atmosphere at who knows how many miles per hour, and you want to _crash_ it? It's doing that all right on its own thank you very much."

Meanwhile the Doctor was pacing. "Think, think, think, _think_… ah-hah!"

Heiji and Saguru both looked at him. "What is it?" Saguru asked.

The Doctor had pulled Saguru cell phone out of his pocket and was dialing a number. "The TARDIS, Martha's phone inside the TARDIS! I can call Conan!"

Heiji was confused. "What's a TARDIS, and what does it have to do with Conan-kun?"

"Then what?" Saguru asked. "'Sorry Conan, we're sort of trapped here, we're about to die so we're just letting you know that you'll be all alone now."

"No no no!" the Doctor replied. "I've taught companions to drive the TARDIS before, sort of. Of course I was there at the time teaching them, and no one ever really truly mastered it, but maybe I can coach Conan well enough over the phone for him to come pick us up!"

"You're mad," Saguru said to that.

"No, it'll work, really! The TARDIS has a function that if set she'll lock onto me once in flight. I just need to tell Conan how to set it… Ah! Conan! Listen, we're in a bit of a pickle, and we need you to do something for us."

Saguru snatched the phone out of the Doctor's hand. "What he means is that we're all about to die, and he's going to tell you how to pilot the TARDIS to come rescue us."

_"This plan sucks even more than the first one."_

The Doctor grabbed the phone back. "Which is why I need you to listen very carefully."

Heiji meanwhile was pressing buttons on the control panel. "Okay, so maybe we can't fly it, but we can at least get it to land in the ocean or something, right? Or somewhere equally uninhabited?" The computer burbled something at him in a language that used a lot of H noises. "I would love to know what the hell it just said."

"It said, 'Steering controls are non-functional.' AKA, you pushed the right button, it just isn't working at the moment," Saguru enlightened.

Heiji's eyebrow shot into his hairline. "You speak an alien language?"

"The TARDIS automatically translates it for me."

Heiji's other eyebrow joined the first. "Very soon I am going to learn what a TARDIS is, and what the hell it has to do with Conan-kun."

"It's… not the Conan you're thinking of," Saguru said. "And he probably won't be very happy to see you. The Conan you're thinking of is still in Osaka, completely oblivious to everything."

Heiji slammed another button, hoping for a response. To his surprise, a map of some sort appeared on the view screen, streets in orange and a great red dot in the middle of it. The computer burbled something else. "What did it say this time?"

"It said, 'Projected landing site.'"

"But…" Heiji trailed off. He started searching the control panel. "Is there a zoom out function on here?" Saguru reached forward and pressed a small green button. The map zoomed out. "Further… further…"

The area around the red dot began to take shape. "But that's… that's Osaka," Saguru breathed.

Heiji reached out and pushed an identical small green button. The map zoomed in again. "And that dot… that's Osaka Police Headquarters."

The two of them shared a look. Then Heiji started rummaging around in his pockets. "I've got to warn them. I've got to get them out of there!" He pulled out his cell phone and his face lit up. "I've got service!" He hurriedly punched in a number. "Come on, pick up the phone… Dad! Dad, listen, it's me! You've got to evacuate the police station immediately!"

_"Why, Heiji?"_

"Because, um, because there's this, this plane. Yeah, that's right, this airplane! And it's making a crash course for the station! There're terrorists! And they want to destroy the station! That's why you've got to get everybody out!"

Heiji was reassured several moment later by the sound of the fire alarm coming through the phone. _"Okay then, I believe you. But I'm going to want to know everything later. How do you know about this plane anyway?"_

"Just get out of the station and as far away as possible, okay Dad?"

Hattori Heizo must have sensed something in his son's voice. _"Heiji, __how do you know about the plane__?"_

Heiji glanced over at the Doctor. The look on his face was not reassuring. A countdown appeared on the view screen, and the computer burbled again. Heiji put the phone to his shoulder. "What did it say this time?"

Saguru was staring at the countdown. "Ten minutes until impact."

Heiji held the phone to his ear again. "Dad, you've got," he glanced at the screen, "just over nine minutes to get everybody out. Hurry!"

_"Damn it Heiji answer me! How do you know about the plane?"_

Heiji looked at the Doctor, who was now practically yelling into Saguru's phone. He looked at Saguru, who had a morbid fixation on the timer. And he looked at the timer, the milliseconds flying by and making time seem like it was passing by faster than ever.

_"Heiji! Answer me, Heiji! Heiji! Are you still there Heiji? Heiji!"_

He slowly held the phone close to his ear. "Talk to you later, Dad."

_"Heiji, god damn it, just answer my question! Heiji!"_

The connection went off and the phone went into his pocket.

Just then a strange sound filled the control room. "Yes!" the Doctor shouted. "He's done it!"

"Music to my ears!" Saguru crowed.

Heiji watched, hoping that it was the TARDIS they kept talking about. His hopes were more than a little dashed when an old blue box appeared. "What the hell is that?"

The Doctor bounced up to it and shoved his key in the lock. "It's the TARDIS my dear Heiji! Now come on, we haven't got all day," he added as he threw open the door and ran inside.

"But…" Heiji said. "It's a box."

"Oh move on," Saguru complained, shoving him through the doorway and then shutting it behind himself.

The Doctor by that time was busy bouncing around the console. "Let's leave, shall we? Next stop Osaka!"

A snort drew Heiji's attention to Conan, who was sitting on the jump seat. "Your plans suck. All of them ever."

"I was working on a time limit! I'd like to see you come up with something better!"

The TARDIS shuddered. Conan managed to stay still on the jump seat, and Saguru grabbed onto a handy column again, but Heiji, who was too busy being in awe, fell to the floor. When the TARDIS finally stopped shuddering, he sat up rubbing his head. "Ow."

"So, what's the big emergency that no one's told me about yet?" Conan asked, arms folded.

"The ship was about to crash into Osaka Police Headquarters," Saguru explained, "And the only way out of the command center was blasted apart."

"Osaka… But Hattori, your father-" Conan started, worried.

"Is okay, I think," Heiji answered. "I managed to call him and get him to evacuate the building. I still should probably check up on him though."

"Grand idea!" the Doctor nearly shouted. "Come along then Heiji! Saguru, Conan, you stay here. I'll be right back."

Heijie found himself getting dragged out of the TARDIS. As soon as the Doctor shut the door behind the two of them, he stopped. "That Conan…" he started.

"Is different," Heiji finished. "It's obvious that he's angrier about something. You don't want me to say a word about this to anyone, right?"

The Doctor smiled. "You're rather perceptive, aren't you? Especially not Conan. This Conan doesn't actually exist; there were some paradox problems a while ago. The other Conan, the one who's still living with Mouri Ran, doesn't remember any of it. It's best that it remains that way."

"By the way," Heiji said, "I don't think we've been properly introduced yet. Obviously Hakuba told you my name, but that doesn't really count." Heiji held out his hand. "Hattori Heiji."

The Doctor took it, shaking the hand. "The Doctor. Just the Doctor."

To the Doctor's surprise, Heiji didn't let go. Instead two of his fingers inched forward and latched around his wrist. "Two pulses," Heiji said. "You have two hearts."

The Doctor said nothing, wondering where this was going.

"I'd like to know something," Heiji said. "There was an alien here, a long time ago. He lived here for four years before he left again. I think he was one of your kind, though I'm not sure. He had two hearts and he looked like a human, or at least he could make himself look human. He could change what he looked like, so that seems likely."

"Do you have a name?" the Doctor asked.

Heiji shook his head. "No. Just something temporary that he adopted for the sole purpose of living here. I know that's not a lot to go on, but if you know of anyone?"

The Doctor shook his head. "I'm sorry, I don't. You've described a Time Lord rather accurately, but unfortunately they're all dead. I'm the only one left. I couldn't help you even if I wanted to."

"I'm sorry," Heiji echoed back.

The Doctor grinned. "Nah, forget about it. Your father's probably worried. You'd better run off and reassure him of your wellbeing."

Heiji started jogging off. "I will. And thanks for everything!"

* * *

**Reviews much appreciated. I hope no one's too OOC, or that the alien's voices didn't drive anyone too insane.**


	9. Time and Space and the Doctors Plural

**Time and Space and Doctors Plural**

**Timeframe: I'm thinking some time during the 2009 specials. Early on, like before the Next Doctor. Either that or between series 2 and 3, can't decide.**

**Summary: The Doctor is on Rondel 2. So is the Doctor. This could get complicated.**

**Disclaimer: I dun own Doctor Who or Detective Conan**

**Notes: There is also a Fullmetal Alchemist crossover in here. Because I can. I started writing this eons ago, but got stuck halfway through. Deleted a bit and typed the rest up today. That's why Sarah Jane seems as if she isn't even there. She originally had a larger part but that plot was decimated by the backspace key.**

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"So Doctor, where are we?"

The Doctor looked around at the alien planet, grinning. "Rondel. Rondel 2 to be exact. Brilliant place. A bit hot, but they have some really good food here."

Saguru's stomach growled. "Good. I could use some food."

The Doctor's grin faded somewhat. "Funny though, I think I've been here before."

Saguru visibly slumped. "Doctor, if you hadn't been here before, how would you know they have good food?"

"Point!" the Doctor nearly shouted. "Come on then! Allons-y!"

The Doctor started picking his way through the bustling crowd, leaving Saguru no choice but to follow. As he did he tried to look around without losing sight of him, but it was harder than he'd expected. He was quickly distracted by a singing fountain made of some sort of black metal. He stood there looking at it for some time listening to it before he recognized the tune: Silent Night. Chuckling slightly, he found himself humming along.

"Beautiful, isn't it? The rhythmic vibrations of organaetium create some of the most beautiful sounds in the Sechew Cluster."

Saguru glanced at the stranger. He was grinning at him, a long nose the main feature of his face. Dark curls popped out from under a floppy hat, his maroon-colored coat was unbuttoned, and a ridiculously long scarf was nearly dragging on the ground.

Saguru didn't mention any of this though. For all he knew, really long scarves were the height of fashion. The stranger droned on. "See, the organaetium is welded into different shapes and sizes, and each different shape or size produces a different note of varying length. I'm sure the best organaetium fountain I've ever come across was one that played Yellow Submarine. Of course, there was also Beethoven's Fifth, and the theme song from 'By the Light of the Asteroid'."

Saguru glanced around and realized that the Doctor was nowhere in sight. "I'm sure the history of organaetium fountains is very fascinating, but I must get back to my friend. He's probably wondering where I am."

The stranger flicked his hand at Saguru. "Of course, of course, run along then. You wouldn't want to keep your friend waiting."

It seemed that almost as soon as Saguru had left the fountain the Doctor popped out of nowhere. "There you are! No time for dilly-dallying, I thought you were hungry! Come on, I know the perfect place. Their Venusian ramen is to die for."

Saguru found himself grabbed the hand and dragged along so many crowded twisting streets that he couldn't have found his way back to the TARDIS if he'd wanted to. Eventually the Doctor stopped, giving Saguru a chance to catch his breath, and pointed at a stall from which the smell of good food was wafting. "There. Pandro's Takeout, complete with a countertop at which to sit."

At the smell, Saguru's stomach growled loudly. The Doctor heard this, glancing at him. Saguru smiled sheepishly. "Well what are we waiting for then?"

The two of them went and sat down at the counter. "We'll have two servings of Venusian ramen please."

"Coming up," the waiter replied, and turned around and started shouting into the kitchen. Five minutes later, two steaming bowls of red ramen noodles in a greenish broth were served. Herbs floated like boats on a lake.

Saguru eyed his lunch. Then he eyed the Doctor tucking in with gusto. He grabbed his spoon, gathered up a bite, blew on it, and ate it. He was surprised at the taste. It was spicy, yet with an underlying sweetness and the slightest hint of chicken.

So involved was he in his food that he didn't notice the two people sit down next to him at first. "Two servings of Venusian ramen please, and make it snappy we're in a bit of a hurry."

Next to him, the Doctor stiffened. "_You!_"

Saguru looked to his right. Lo and behold, the man with the scarf and the floppy hat was sitting next to him. "Me?" he asked. "Why yes it's me. Of course it's me. I'm always me."

"What the bloody hell are you doing here?"

"Waiting for Venusian ramen. Is it any good?"

"But… but… but…"

"But may I ask, who're you?"

"I'm you!"

"But I'm me!"

"But you're also me!"

"But if I'm you and you're me, then why are you here? You knew I'd be here."

"No I didn't! Two hundred years can make you forget a few things!"

"Doctor, who is he?" came from two different parties.

"Why, he's me!" the two different Doctors answered.

"So because my memory's a bit iffy," Saguru's Doctor started, "Remind me when you are. Sarah Jane? Romana? Leela?"

"Oh, Sarah Jane's around here somewhere. This is Ed," he added, gesturing behind him.

A long-haired blond poked his head around the Doctor. "Hi," Ed said, waving.

Saguru fell off his stool. "UWAAH! _YOU!_"

Ed raised an eyebrow, a disdainful look on his face. "Do I know you?"

"Yes! I mean no! I mean not yet! Hell, I don't even exist yet!"

Ed's look moved to Saguru's Doctor. "Is he high?"

"He's just having timey-wimey issues, he'll be sane again in a moment."

"Doctor, can we go now?" Saguru asked in a small voice.

"No, you haven't finished your ramen yet."

"_DOCTOR!!_" came the shrill female cry.

"That would be Sarah Jane," the Doctors said simultaneously. They ran off in the direction of the scream, their companions following.

After rescuing Sarah Jane from the Vandorian who was hitting on her (the Vandorian way; they take it literally and are rather large), the five of them started wandering back to Pandro's Takeout whilst explaining things to Sarah Jane. When they got there, Saguru started tugging on his Doctor's sleeve again. "How about now? Can we go now?"

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "No Saguru. I thought you were hungry. What's wrong with finishing your ramen?"

The waiter gave Saguru a menacing look. "There's something wrong with your ramen?" he asked, as if daring Saguru to reply in the positive.

Saguru threw up his hands in a calming gesture. "Oh no, nothing's wrong with it. It's quite perfect actually."

"Then why do you want to leave?" the Doctor asked.

Saguru opened his mouth to reply, but then felt a hand slip into his pocket. He looked down to see a little humanoid kid picking his pocket. "Hey-"

The child gave him an unrepentant grin and ran off. Saguru felt a slight tug on his belt and heard the sound of breaking chains. The kid held something silver in his hand.

"My pocket watch!" he exclaimed, charging after the kid. "You give that back!"

"Saguru!" the Doctor shouted.

"I'll look after him," Ed assured, running after Saguru.

Ed's Doctor gave the other Doctor a toothy grin. "Don't worry. Ed knows what he's doing."

"Oh I know," the Doctor replied, sipping some of his speedily cooling ramen.

* * *

Saguru knew that Ed was chasing him. That was the last thing he wanted. What he wanted was his pocket watch back. That was looking less and less likely though as the kid seemed to have an unlimited supply of energy and speed.

Suddenly Ed had caught up with him. "Leave him to me," Ed said, grinning wildly. "You're not the only one who has had a pocket watch pickpocket problem."

"I'd really rather-" Saguru started, but stopped when Ed leapt ahead. Saguru sighed, only bothering to keep up now, as a switchblade came out of Ed's right arm.

A quick flip sent Ed flying over the pickpocket. Almost too fast to see, he grabbed the kid and held the knife to him. "I believe you have something of my friend's."

Saguru's pocket watch slipped out of limp fingers. Seeing it clatter to the ground, Ed released the child. He fled the scene as fast as he could while Ed knelt to pick up the pocket watch.

"Please don't," Saguru said, but it was too late.

Ed studied the griffin design on the pocket watch in the light. "Funny. I thought mine was the only one like it."

"It still is," Saguru said bitterly.

"Who are you?" Ed asked, walking closer.

"Like I said, I don't exist yet," Saguru replied, taking the pocket watch from Ed and slipping it back into his pocket.

"Well in any case we should be getting back to the Doctors," Ed said, starting to walk off.

Saguru didn't follow at first. Finally, "They think you've abandoned them."

Ed stopped and looked over his shoulder. "What?" he asked nonchalantly.

"You heard exactly what I said." Ed didn't contradict him. "They think you've gone and left them. They think you can't be bothered to be tethered down with a family. Your brother... he's wondering when you turned into your father. And there's a little girl who just wants to meet the uncle she's heard so much about."

Ed looked at the ground. "Al..." He then looked up at Saguru suddenly. "He's got a kid? A girl?"

Saguru nodded. "Just like you. And they want you back."

"But..." Ed started, then stopped. "I'm being selfish, aren't I?"

Saguru nodded. "The thrill of the chase isn't worth what you're losing."

Ed remained silent.

"It doesn't end you know," Saguru assured. "It turns out you're a wonderful storyteller. No one believes you of course, but it stops them from hating you. And later, much later, one of them finally does believe you when he sees it with his own eyes."

Ed smiled. "That sounds good. I think I'll like looking forward to that."

* * *

The Doctor was surprised to find that when Ed and Saguru got back, Saguru stopped begging to leave. In fact, he moved his now cold bowl of ramen over next to Ed and they traded stories of their travels while eating. The Doctors shared a look and shrugged; Sarah Jane looked like she was feeling slightly left out.

Once they were all done with their ramen it turned out that the two TARDISes were actually parked rather close to each other. They walked together until time came to part.

The Doctor doffed his hat. "Farewell then."

The Doctor gave a lazy two-fingered salute. "Don't trip on that scarf."

The Doctor was indignant. "This scarf was knitted by Madame Nostradamus!"

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "Yes I know. Now get out of here before we really start arguing."

Saguru waved at Ed. "See you soon."

Ed waved back. "See you later."

A few more goodbyes were said, and the two parties parted ways. Once they had entered the TARDIS, the Doctor lazed over to the console. "You know Saguru, right after this encounter Ed asked to go home. It seemed completely out of the blue. You wouldn't happen to know anything about this, would you?"

Saguru didn't quite answer. "You know Doctor, I think a quick visit home is in order."

The Doctor's eyebrows raised. "Oh? Tokyo?"

Saguru shook his head. "No, not Tokyo. There's this old folks home in London. My mother leaves the country for work a lot, and my grandfather gets lonely. I'd like to pop by and cheer him up."

The Doctor smiled a knowing smile. "Of course."

* * *

**Not Too Long Later**

Ed looked up from the book he was reading as the door opened. "Ah, Saguru. What a pleasant surprise."

Saguru smirked back. "Grandfather, you knew I was coming."

Ed sighed. "Well yes, after your mother told me you were missing I knew it was only a matter of time."

"I came straight here," Saguru replied. "Well, not straight here. There was a small run-in with some finger vampires, but we sorted that out pretty quick."

"That sounds interesting. Why don't you tell me about it?"

Saguru sat down. "Of course."

* * *

**The finger vampires may or may not be elaborated upon later. Originally Saguru was going to visit his mother to make sure she hadn't fallen prey to them, and then get guilt-tripped into visiting Ed. Because originally Ed was in a mental hospital because he tried to publish his memoirs as nonfiction. I'm sure you can see the problem with that. Reviews, as always, are highly appreciated.**


	10. Time and Space and Pete's World

**Time and Space and Pete's World**

**Timeframe: After Season 4.**

**Summary: Dealing with the parents of his parallel self who happens to be in a grave was not exactly on Conan's To Do list. Fortunately Ran's there to help him out.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Detective Conan or Doctor Who.**

**Notes: This, if you hadn't gathered already, takes place in Pete's World after Paradox!Conan goes to live with Shrunk!Ran and the Tylers. Have fun!**

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Yukiko floated through the museum like a ghost. Whenever she was in London she made a point to come here. Her son's grave was in Tokyo, but his spirit was here, in the Sherlock Holmes museum. Because surely he had died while pursuing his passion. The circumstances were too odd to be anything but.

Yusaku had wanted to look into it. Yukiko made him promise that he wouldn't. She didn't want to lose him too. Undoubtedly he was anyway, but at least he was being careful since she couldn't find any evidence of it.

They had taken him here, once. When he was nine. His eyes had grown wide, and he had happily spent the entire day there. He'd rambled about Sherlock Holmes to anyone within earshot, regardless of the fact that none of them could understand what he was saying. Except one old woman, who'd complimented her on her son's intelligence. The old woman told him that someday, he would be a famous mystery writer. He had folded his arms petulantly and proclaimed, "That's my dad! I wanna be a detective!"

Something brushed against her legs. She looked down to see two young children run down the hall. The boy turned his head to her to reveal Japanese descent and large glasses. "Sorry!" he shouted. Yukiko didn't notice the truncated nature of the sentence, or the flash of recognition. She only remembered a very similar young boy running along the exhibits, eager to see everything.

Slowly she wandered the museum, stopping only to glance at the exhibits. Then, coming from a corner, she heard the whispered voices of children. Now that she didn't have faces to go with them, they seemed straight out of her memories. Wanting to stay in her memories, she crept closer.

The two children from before were crouching in the corner, the boy holding something in his hands. Yukiko saw that the girl was also Japanese, and smiled at that. She looked just like Ran had at her age.

"So, what are you doing here?" the boy was asking the thing in his hand. Yukiko inched around for a better look, and nearly screamed.

It was a praying mantis. Two preying mantises. And they were blue. And then the smaller one answered. "We are creating a omnibus of detective literature," it answered, its mandibles clicking. "To do so, we are gathering examples of the art from many planets. And as such, it would be overlooking the greatest Earth has to offer to not visit this museum."

The boy's face lit up. "Seriously? Detective novels from space? You're completely admirable!"

"But the point still stands," the girl said. "You're scaring the locals. Could you at least go about it a little less obviously?"

"Oh, well, we're done here now anyway. Save the best for last and all that. Sorry for the trouble."

"No trouble at all," the boy insisted. "It was a pleasant distraction. By the way, I don't suppose I could get a copy of this omnibus when you're done, could I?"

"Of course," the larger mantis said. "We'll even translate it into English for you, right dear?" it said, nudging the other one with what looked like an elbow. "It's always nice to run into another fan of the art. Who should we send it to?"

"Conan Edogawa, at Torchwood. It'll find its way to me. Thanks a lot."

"You're very welcome. Now come on dear, Raxacoricofallapatorius is waiting."

Yukiko gasped as the preying mantises vanished in a flash of purple light. The two children spun around. "Oka...Oh no!" the boy hissed.

Yukiko fell to her knees in front of him and pulled the glasses from his face. She hadn't missed the slip-up. "But... we buried you... Oh my god we buried you!" She pulled him into a tight hug, weeping onto him.

He wriggled out of her grasp and took the glasses back. "Yes. Yes you did," he said, putting them back on. "Shin-chan is dead and buried. And I'm not him."

Yukiko looked, really _looked_, at the girl. "And you're Ran... You're Ran. Your parents were so worried! Why couldn't you tell us where you were?"

The boy grabbed the girl's hand. "We really have to go."

Yukiko shook her head. "No! You can't go! You have to tell us where you've been, you have to tell us why, why did you leave us?"

"There's a price on our heads. You can't tell anyone you've seen us. Not anyone," the boy said. And then they were gone.

* * *

Yusaku knew when he needed outside help. He knew when things were so big, he just couldn't handle it alone. And his investigation had led him to that sort of big. Which was why he was currently sitting on a small couch outside a plush Torchwood office, watching the hustle and bustle of one of the stranger government organizations on Earth.

He was abruptly torn from his thoughts when someone carrying a large stack of binders slipped directly to his right. His head turned to see what had happened. He saw the culprit quickly enough, a pen that someone had dropped, but this was quickly shoved aside by the sight of the person carrying the binders.

It was a boy, of Japanese descent, around the age of seven. He looked comical with one of the binders lying open over his head, but Yusaku didn't notice that. Instead he noticed the boy's face staring at him, dredging up memories from long ago. The boy blinked twice. He then chuckled nervously and ducked beneath the pile of binders, shuffling around for something mostly out of view.

Yusaku saw a pair of glasses on the floor to the side of the pile. He picked them up and examined them offhandedly. Their resemblance to his own was more than uncanny. He crouched next to the moving pile of binders and held them out. "Looking for these?"

The boy's head popped up again, and his face lit up. "Ah-hah! Thank you!" He took them and shoved them back on a little too quickly.

Yusaku smiled softly and mysteriously. "No problem. You know Shinichi, you pulled off a better Reichenbach Falls than even Holmes did. Do I dare to ask how?"

Shinichi froze. He then grinned widely, scratching the back of his neck. "What are you talking about? My name's Conan Edogawa."

One of Yusaku's eyebrows raised. "Oh really? And that name has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that somewhere there's a particular bookshelf with Doyle shelved right next to Edogawa?"

Shinichi dropped the pretense. "Fine. I suppose I always had a snowball's chance in Hell of fooling you."

Yusaku started stacking the binders, and Shinichi joined him. "Plus, when Watson first met Holmes again, Holmes was carrying a stack of books and dropped them. There are times when things transcend coincidence and instead become great big flashing neon signs. This is one of those times. So, mind telling me how you did it?"

Shinichi was blunt. "There was a paradox, and I didn't have anywhere to go. So when the chance was offered, I came to a parallel world that didn't have me anymore."

Yusaku paused, light reflecting off of his glasses. "So you did actually die."

Shinichi shook his head. "No. I didn't die. He did. I'm a replacement, left to pick up the pieces."

Yusaku caught sight of someone behind Shinichi. "Well, I see you've found one of them."

Shinichi turned to look too just as Ran called out. "Conan! A package arrived for you! It's probably that omnibus!"

Shinichi smiled widely. "Great!" He then turned back to Yusaku. "Yeah. Yeah I have. We're staying here for the time being. It's not safe for us in Japan anymore, and probably not safe anywhere if we aren't careful. But I promise, as soon as we can we're coming home. I promise we'll be back someday."

Yusaku stacked the last binder. "Actually, I may be able to help you there, at least a little. Yukiko made me promise not to, but I've been looking into a rather intriguing double case of death and disappearance. I've uncovered some interesting things, which is why I'm here in the first place."

Shinichi shook his head. "Torchwood deals with aliens, you know that. They wouldn't be interested in a criminal organization."

"Well..." Yusaku trailed off mysteriously.

Shinichi's jaw hit the ground. "Are you implying what I think you're implying?"

"Depends. What do you think I'm implying?"

Ran walked over and smacked Shinichi with a package wrapped in brown paper. "What are you plotting now? You're always plotting something." She held out the package. "This should distract you. It's the omnibus you asked for from Faynor. You probably won't get anything done for a week."

"It's good to see you again, Ran-chan," Yusaku commented.

"Yusaku-sensei!" Ran noted, surprised. She looked between him and Shinichi for a few seconds before Shinichi shrugged. She put her hands on her hips. "Yukiko-neesan told you, didn't she?"

Yusaku did a double-take. "Yukiko? She knew?"

Shinichi shrugged again. "We ran into her at the Sherlock Holmes museum two months ago. By the way, what are you doing here specifically?"

"I'm waiting for the person this office belongs to," Yusaku explained. "A Rose Tyler. Do you know her?"

Ran nodded. "She's down in R&D trying to convince the Doctor not to blow something up."

"That could take all day," Shinichi assured Yusaku. "What is it this time?"

"He's convinced that if he does a bunch of stuff, it'll do something that I didn't quite catch. Rose is convinced that he'll blow us all to kingdom come."

Suddenly there was a distant booming sound, and the building shook slightly. "Thar she blows," Shinichi said dryly in a pirate imitation.

"She'll be up as soon as the dust clears," Ran said.

Yusaku blinked twice. "What have you two gotten yourselves into?"

* * *

**Yay! I've been having issues with Sherlock Holmes references sneaking their way into my fics lately, so after I realized just where the binders had come from, I had to lampshade it. Reviews are highly appreciated.**


	11. Time and Space and Heiji

**Time and Space and Heiji**

**Timeframe: During Season 4.**

**Summary: Heiji knew that something bad would happen when he went to Tokyo. He just wasn't expecting a mad dash through abandoned streets running from metal men.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Detective Conan**

**Notes: This one is _really long_. Suffice to say, it is also epic. I have been planning this chapter probably since Chapter 5, and it definitely ties into/follows Chapters 7 and 8. And thanks to The Eleventh Hour, there should be more chapters coming soon.**

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Heiji knew that something bad would happen when he came to Tokyo. But he didn't really mind. Crime in Osaka lately had been rather slow, and his brain felt like it was getting slow from lack of exercise. Murders were bad certainly, but they were going to happen anyway and he might as well give his brain some exercise while the murderers were at it. At least, they were probably going to happen anyway.

So, using a very nice excuse, he and Kazuha had hopped on the train and gone to visit their friends in Tokyo. And he was rather surprised. There hadn't been a single murder yet. They had, despite Conan's protests, spent the day at Tropical Land. Later they had split up, Conan complaining of being tired as a ruse to get away from Tropical Land, and Mouri offering to take him back to the Agency. Ran and Kazuha had decided to go shopping, and before he knew it Heiji was finding himself getting dragged along. And try as he might, he could not come up with a believable excuse to flee the scene.

Then Ran had wandered off to find a bathroom, and they had agreed to meet later at a restaurant they had passed by earlier that looked good called Bad Wolf. So Heiji found himself walking down the street with Kazuha at dusk. Despite the recent rash of disappearances in Tokyo, he was sure that Ran could take care of herself. And even if she couldn't, she could scream loud enough to attract someone who could.

But, as he walked down the street with Kazuha, Heiji thought he saw a glint of metal in an alleyway. He frowned. "Kazuha, you go on ahead. I'll catch up."

"Ahou," Kazuha answered back. "I'm not letting you out of my sight. I know for a fact that you forgot your omamori at home. I'm coming with you."

Heiji glared, but didn't protest. "Fine then. Come on." He grabbed her hand and started dragging her down the alley. He didn't see anything that could have caused the glint though, and they came out onto an abandoned side-street.

"There's nothing here," Kazuha stated.

Heiji had to agree, and turned to go when something caught his eye. "No, you're wrong. Something is here." He walked out into the middle of the street and crouched down next to a manhole that had been left open. "Now who could've left this how it is?"

Kazuha crouched down next to him, and glared at him. "You'd better not be thinking of what I think you're thinking of."

"Oh, I'm thinking of it all right." Heiji pulled a small penlight out of his pocket and shined it down the hole. He couldn't see anything, but that didn't mean there was nothing there. "This might be where all those people have been disappearing to. It would be a good thing if I could solve that, right?"

Kazuha relented. "Fine. But I'm still coming with you."

"Suit yourself," Heiji said as he stuck the penlight in his mouth and climbed down.

Kazuha followed quickly as Heiji scanned the tunnel. "See? There's nothing down here."

Heiji grinned evilly. "Don't tell me you're scared."

"Ahou!" Kazuha argued. "I'm not scared of the sewers! It's just a little creepy down here, that's all."

Heiji rolled his eyes. "Whatever you say, ahou. Come on, there are vague tracks going this way."

Together they walked silently down the tunnel, Heiji's penlight shining on the walls. They walked for a while, until they heard something coming close. Heiji grabbed Kazuha and pulled her into a crevice to hide.

A voice spoke in a strangely metallic, robotic sort of fashion. "Alpha-Omega and Sigma-Omega, patrol the western corridors. Gamma-Delta and Beta-Delta, patrol the southern corridors. Find the intruders and bring them to be converted."

"I obey," replied four similar voices in unison. The stomping sounds started up again, three getting more distant while the other two coming closer. Then two metal men stomped past Heiji and Kazuha's hiding place. They kept silent as the robots – for what else could they be? - walked past their hiding place.

Once they were gone they left the hiding place. "Heiji, let's get out of here," Kazuha whispered.

Heiji found himself torn between making sure that Kazuha got out of danger and figuring out what the hell was going on here. "I've got to find out what's going on," he finally said, almost pleading. "Next manhole we find though, you're getting out of here, okay?"

Kazuha shook her head stubbornly. "I'm not leaving without you."

"Kazuha, I'm not going to argue with you. It's too dangerous for you."

"And it's not too dangerous for you?"

"Kazuha, you know me, and you know I'm not leaving before I find out what's going on."

"And you know that I'm not leaving without you. So I guess I'm coming with you."

"Kazuha..." Heiji whined one last time, but gave up because he knew they were wasting time arguing. "Fine then, come on."

Together they slunk down the dark tunnels, avoiding another patrol. Finally Heiji thought he could hear sounds. Sounds like... power tools? The tunnel opened out into a decent sized area, with several of the metal men seemingly milling about. Heiji and Kazuha stayed in the shadows of the tunnel, and from there Heiji could see three slanted platforms, each set a little ways away from the others, with a large metal box of some function or another next to each of them. At least, he thought they were slanted platforms. He couldn't think of anything else they would be, though why a platform would be slanted was beyond him.

"Look up," Kazuha whispered next to him.

Heiji did so, and sucked in his breath quickly. Above each of the platforms something circular was set into the ceiling. The bottom had cracks in it that indicated that they opened, but there was nothing to indicate why they opened.

A commotion out of view caught his attention. Someone, a woman from the sound of it, was shouting loudly, demanding to be let go. As he and Kazuha watched, two of the metal men dragged in a young woman kicking and screaming. Heiji felt every single instinct in him scream at him to go help her. All but one instinct. He listened to that instinct. That instinct was never wrong.

"Heiji," Kazuha said quietly beside him.

"I know," he replied. "But there's nothing we can do. It'd probably be suicide if we just ran in."

The woman was dragged over to the platform closest to where Heiji and Kazuha were hiding and held against it. Manacles slid up of their own accord and wrapped themselves around her. It was then that Heiji noticed the blood on the floor. He suddenly felt icy. They weren't platforms. They were something far more sinister.

One of the metal men turned to the control panel on the box and flicked a switch. Clamps shot forward and locked the woman's head in place. Another switch and the circular things in the ceiling opened, though Heiji still couldn't make out why. The woman on the table certainly could though; she started screaming at the top of her lungs. The sound of power tools became ever present.

Heiji pushed Kazuha's face against his chest and put a hand over her mouth. "Don't look. Don't make a sound," he warned.

Spinning and cutting blades of all shapes and sizes descended from the ceiling towards the poor woman. Heiji closed his eyes but could still hear her screams and the sound of ripping flesh. Over this sound came a new one, the sound of one of the metal men speaking.

"We are the Cybermen. You will become like us. You will add your suitable organic parts to our army and we will march across this planet. You will all become like us, or be deleted."

After what seemed an eternity both the screams and the sounds of sharp objects died down. Heiji dared to open his eyes again and look at the table. The power tools were just ascending back into the ceiling, and the covering closed after them. On the table lay another of the metal men – Cybermen, apparently. The floor surrounding the table was scattered with chunks of human of varying sizes.

Another Cybermen entered view. "Our numbers have risen to invasion level. Should I give the command?"

"Give the command," the Cyberman who appeared to be in charge ordered.

Heiji felt Kazuha shift, and knew that she was looking. "Oh my god!" she squeaked beside him.

All activity stopped. Heiji swore fluently. Silently.

One of the Cybermen stomped over to their hiding place. "Intruders!" it shouted in that hideous voice that they had.

"RUN!" Heiji shouted, grabbing Kazuha's hand and practically dragging her down the tunnel. Fortunately there was a sharp turn, as behind them Heiji could hear some sort of gunfire. They sprinted as fast as they could, taking as many turns as Heiji could find. Finally he came to a halt at the foot of a ladder to a manhole. "Come on Kazuha," he urged desperately. He climbed up as fast as he could, trying not to slip. He hurried to lift the cover to the sewers. The underside was slimy, but it was worth it as the metal scraped against the concrete and the orange streetlights filtered through the crack. "Come on. We've got to get to Mouri's and make sure everyone's all right. Tell them what's going on."

He felt more than saw Kazuha nod on the ladder below him. He lifted himself out of the sewer tunnel and looked around for Cybermen. None in sight. Good. He reached down and gave Kazuha a helping hand. Once she was clear he pushed the cover back over the hole in the ground. If the Cybermen had managed to follow them, hopefully it would slow them down a little bit.

Kazuha tugged on his arm. "Heiji, let's get out of here," she said quietly.

Heiji nodded curtly. He remembered what they had seen in the sewers, and his stomach roiled. He looked around, getting his bearings. "This way. Mouri's place should be this way. And be quiet; we don't want them to find us. They said something about an invasion, so that means they're probably coming out of the sewers."

He grabbed Kazuha's hand and they ran across the deserted street into an alleyway. Quietly they walked the length of it. He motioned for Kazuha to stay while he poked his head out to make sure that it was all clear.

He spun back into the alley and hugged Kazuha close. There were twelve of them in the middle of the street, marching down it like they owned the place. He hoped to God they didn't see him. He could hear their metal feet clanging against the pavement. He felt Kazuha trembling like a leaf in his arms, and the beating of his hearts seemed loud enough to wake a sleeping Mouri.

The clanging stopped. "Wait," one of them said in its mechanical voice. The clanging of a singular Cybermen came closer and closer to Heiji and Kazuha's hiding spot.

And then it found them. It waved a gun in their face. "You will put your hands up and come with us to be converted."

Heiji moved away from the dirty brick wall, Kazuha hiding behind him, his hands in the air. "What if we refuse?"

"You will submit. There is no alternative."

Heiji took a deep breath. It was everything or nothing now. "Tell me: do you only convert humans?" The Cyberman didn't answer, so Heiji plowed on. "You guys are basically robots, right? Can you scan things? Like, to figure out internal structures and stuff?"

"That is correct," the Cyberman answered.

"Go on then," Heiji egged on. "Scan me."

A green light came from the Cyberman and hit Heiji. He braced himself, but was pleasantly surprised when he didn't feel it. "Non-human components detected. Reaction to conversion process is unknown."

Kazuha shifted behind Heiji, but he couldn't worry about that now. He had to get them out of there. "You'll have to let us go then, won't you? You want to fill your numbers, right? Well it wouldn't work if two of your soldiers were defective. So you'll just have to let us go."

The next words to come from the Cyberman's mouthpiece chilled Heiji to the bone. "The female is compatible. She will be converted. The male is incompatible. He will be terminated." The Cyberman's gun was fired. Heiji cried out.

"_NO!_" Kazuha tried to grab him as he fell but he slipped through her mostly limp fingers. She fell to her knees and grabbed at him, tears stinging at her eyes. "_HEIJI!_"

She fought the metal fingers that wrapped themselves around her arms. Heiji was still breathing. He was dying, but he was still alive. If she could just get the two of them away from there and get help, everything could be okay again. She screamed and sobbed, blinded by grief.

She didn't notice the arrival of others. All she knew was when the metal fingers went slack, and she was able to tear herself away from them. She rushed back to Heiji and fell down next to him. His eyes were scrunched up in pain, and she quickly lifted his head into her lap. "Heiji. Talk to me Heiji."

His eyes opened slightly. "Kaz..." he whispered. He started to say something else, but stopped.

Kazuha leaned her ear closer to his mouth. "What, Heiji?"

What he said, none of the onlookers heard. Whatever it was caused Kazuha to go limp again, and tinted her cheeks pink. The Doctor, whilst angry that Saguru had found some glitterguns in the bowels of the TARDIS and thus armed himself, Donna, and Conan, found himself forgetting his anger for a moment as he ran over to the couple and picked Heiji up.

Kazuha grabbed at the hem of his coat, stopping him. "Where are you taking him?"

"The TARDIS," he answered softly. "I can help him."

Kazuha nodded and let go of his coat. He started towards where the TARDIS was parked across the street and between Bad Wolf Café and a consignment shop. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Donna help Kazuha up, while Saguru and Conan kept guard. They all jogged to the TARDIS, Saguru being the last one in and shutting the door firmly behind them.

As soon as he was in the TARDIS the Doctor rushed over to the console and leaned Heiji against it. "Heiji. Heiji, can you hear me?" Heiji's eyes met the Doctor's, and his head lolled in a nod. "Good. That's good Heiji. Last time we met, you hear me? Last time we met, you asked me about an alien that lived on Earth for four years. Four years, remember Heiji?"

The Doctor sensed that he was losing him, so he slapped him lightly on the cheek. "Pay attention, this is important. Four years. Four years is long enough to have a child, right? I'm right, right?"

"Mom," Heiji croaked out.

The Doctor took this as the yes it was and continued. "Do you feel some sort of, I dunno, a ball of energy inside you or something like that?"

Heiji nodded. The Doctor's next words could not be mistaken as anything other than dead serious. "Concentrate on it. Let it flow through you. When it's inside all of you, just... turn on the tap. Do you understand what I'm trying to say?"

Heiji nodded again. The Doctor put his hand on his shoulder. "It's all up to you now." He stood up and backed off.

Kazuha broke away from where she had been standing next to Donna. "You can't just leave him there! He's dying!"

The Doctor put out a hand to stop her. "He was shot at point-blank range by a Cyberman weapon. He died the moment he hit the ground. I've done all I can."

"But-" Kazuha started, but the Doctor cut her off.

"You can't interfere. If you do, it could be deadly for both of you."

"So you're just going to let him die there on the ground while we watch?"

Sensing that Kazuha was about to duck under his arm, he grabbed her with an iron grip and looked her in the eye. "You cannot go to him," he restated.

"Why the hell not?" Kazuha asked, matching his look. "Nothing's going to happen. Nothing except him dying."

"Time Lords are different," the Doctor explained. "We regenerate."

Kazuha gave a short, crazed, panicked laugh. "Yeah? And what does that have to do with the price of onigiri in Okinawa?"

"Heiji's..." the Doctor started, but he stopped and his eyes filled with pity. "You mean he never told you? Not anything?"

Kazuha's brow furrowed. "Told me what?" she asked, scared.

At that moment, Heiji's hand reached up and grasped the edge of the console. The hand glowed slightly with golden light. It pulled him up and his other hand joined it. He leaned heavily on both of them and his head raised. His eyes met Kazuha's, and they were terrified.

His body went rigid. It filled with the golden light, flowing from every pore. Saguru's jaw had dropped, and Conan bitterly thought that Saguru was having an 'I knew it, he's an alien' moment. Conan glanced at Kazuha, who was frozen in shock.

The golden light faded away. And a stranger fell to the ground, out for the count.

The Doctor forgot Kazuha as he ran forward to check Heiji's pulse. He smiled widely. "He did it."

Donna had taken up Kazuha-wrangling, whose hysterics had begun again in earnest. "Where's Heiji?" she demanded. "Where'd he go? What did you do with him? Heiji!"

The Doctor picked Heiji up. "The Infirmary is the best place now. Saguru, explain things to her. Conan, keep an eye on the monitor and give a shout if the Cybermen seem to find us. Donna, just... keep at it."

The Doctor descended into the bowels of the ship, and Kazuha broke away from Donna to follow him. "I'm not letting you out of my sight. Where's Heiji?" she demanded again.

"This is Heiji," the Doctor said, nodding towards his burden. "I don't think we've been introduced. I'm the Doctor. What's your name?"

"You're the Doctor?" Kazuha repeated derisively. "Do you 'fix' people by replacing them with other people or something?"

"Yeah Doctor, I'm sorta curious too," Donna butted in. "What the hell just happened?"

"Humans, you've got no patience. Saguru, explain."

Saguru folded his arms as he followed. "How can I explain if I don't even know everything that's going on? Is Hattori a Time Lord or not, because you were pretty sure they were all dead."

The Doctor glared at all of them. "Fine! Heiji here is, I'm pretty sure, a quarter Time Lord. So Saguru, in answer to your query, he both is and isn't a Time Lord. I didn't know there was even a little bit of Time Lord left in the universe because Heiji and his mother apparently do not know how to tap into their telepathic powers. If they did, then I would have felt them in my head."

It was now Donna's turn to fold her arms and demand answers. "But that doesn't make sense. You suddenly dragged us away from the Cybermen's base because you claimed to feel a telepathic cry. How can you feel a telepathic cry leading you to this kid if this kid can't use telepathy?"

"Where the hell is Heiji?" Kazuha asked again.

"This is Heiji," the Doctor repeated. "And telepathy is like reading. You need to be taught it, but at the same time you need the mental capacity to do it in the first place. If you sat down with an ordinary house cat and tried to teach it to read, it would just glare at you and demand you pet it. But human children can be taught to read easily, because they have the mental capacity. And sometimes the youngsters manage to teach themselves, especially when they absolutely need to. Heiji was in that sort of situation. He needed to tell someone that the Cybermen had shot him and were about to drag... what is your name? Really, just tell me, that'll make everything so much easier."

"Kazuha. Toyama Kazuha."

"Yes, he needed to tell someone that they were about to drag Kazuha off to be converted. So suddenly he was able to send off a short, simple message. No words, just the simple meaning of needing help."

Kazuha suddenly rushed forward and blocked the Doctor's way. "What the hell is going on? You tell me right now!"

The Doctor turned to the door next to him, which opened to admit him, as he answered, "Heiji regenerated."

"And what the hell does that mean?" Kazuha shouted at him as he lay Heiji down on the nearest bed in the Infirmary.

"Time Lords have the ability to cheat death," he explained as he waved some sort of glowy rod over Heiji.

"And what is that?"

"This is an x-ray device. A Time Lord is a kind of alien. My people, actually."

"What does that have to do with Heiji?"

Saguru sighed. "What the Doctor has been explaining in a rather roundabout way while you were panicking is that our friend here is not entirely human."

Kazuha stopped. "You're all crazy. All of you. I demand to know where Heiji is so I can get away from you people."

The Doctor gestured to a screen on the wall. "If you don't believe us, see for yourself."

Kazuha turned to the screen. "But that's... that's two hearts."

The Doctor nodded. "Yes. Yes that is. And they appear to be functioning normally, which is very very good. I wasn't sure if Heiji had enough Time Lord in him to regenerate successfully, but everything appears to be working."

"But... that's not Heiji," Kazuha protested quietly.

The Doctor put his hands on her shoulders and steered her towards the bed. "When a Time Lord dies, they can regenerate instead to cheat death. It means that every cell in their body changes. Every single cell. So you're right. He's not Heiji. But at the same time he is Heiji. He has all of Heiji's memories. He remembers what the two of you were doing today before the Cybermen attacked. And he remembers the day before that, and the day before that, and the week before that, and the month before that. It's still Heiji in there. The face is different, but he's still Heiji."

Kazuha stood there, staring at the unconscious body on the bed. Finally she said, "Oh my God he's an alien."

"He's mostly human," the Doctor rationalized.

Kazuha looked up at him. "And you're an alien." She waved her hand at the ship in general. "And this is alien."

"Right on both counts. And Kazuha, I need you to do something for me."

"What is it?" Kazuha asked, her tone of voice suspicious.

"There are still a lot of Cybermen out there. And I need to stop them before they kill any more people. Heiji's going to wake up soon, and he's going to need both A, a familiar face which counts Donna out, and B, one he's not antagonistic to which counts Saguru out."

"You want me to stay with him," Kazuha said quietly, not meeting his eyes.

"Yes."

"Well what about Conan-kun? They're really good friends."

"That's not Conan," Donna answered for the Doctor. "That's Conan's evil twin."

The Doctor shook his head back and forth as if weighing options. "Close enough. Conan can't do it because I need someone to watch the monitors and make sure that the Cybermen don't find the TARDIS."

"Is this the TARDIS?" Kazuha asked.

"Yes, this is the TARDIS."

"It's bigger on the inside."

"Everyone says that," Saguru replied.

"You get used to it," Donna added.

"So will you stay with him?" the Doctor asked.

Kazuha hesitated, then nodded. "Yeah. Yeah I will. Just... don't take too long, okay?"

The Doctor nodded. "Good. Good. I'll try not to. Donna, Saguru, why don't you go out into the console room and see if you can gather anything from the monitors, okay?"

Donna and Saguru, gathering that the Doctor wanted to be alone with Kazuha, obliged quickly. The Doctor smiled at Heiji's sleeping body briefly before continuing. "Now Kazuha, there are a couple of things you should know. When he wakes up, Heiji will probably be suffering from severe regeneration sickness. Discounting outside intervention, the first regeneration is the hardest, and the fact that he is only a quarter Time Lord will undoubtedly escalate that. Heiji may be disoriented, have temporary amnesia, be in physical pain, and just generally act abnormal."

"You've regenerated, right?"

"Yes. Why?"

"What's the worst thing you've done?"

The Doctor could have answered that with any number of examples, but he realized right off that she was just referring to regeneration. "I tried to throttle my companion," he replied bluntly. Seeing Kazuha's face go ashen, he quickly tried to rectify the situation. "But that regeneration was pompous and full of himself, and I quickly stopped myself. I doubt Heiji will do anything like that."

Kazuha nodded. "Okay. So I just stay here?"

"Yes. And when Heiji wakes up, just talk to him and be gentle."

"Okay. I think I've got it."

The Doctor smiled. "Really? Good. I'll be leaving now with Donna and Saguru, but if you really need help, Conan will be in the console room." He turned and left, and shut the door behind himself.

* * *

Kazuha had taken to wandering the Infirmary and staring at the machines with more than a little incredulity. She stopped when she heard a grunt, and coughing. She turned around, and saw that Heiji was shifting on the bed. "Heiji?" she asked quietly, inching forward.

Heiji's eyes snapped open and he pushed himself up, turning his head to look at her. Kazuha stopped in her tracks. Any doubts she had left fled her mind. His skin was a tad paler, his hair a tad curlier, his face a tad rounder. But his eyes were still that lovely turquoise color she knew. "Kazuha?" he asked, then looked around. "Where are we?"

Kazuha swallowed. "You've lost your Kansai-ben."

Heiji frowned. "Really? Have I? It seems I have. It's me. It's me. It's me. It's me," he repeated, trying and failing to speak in Kansai-ben. Kazuha found herself giggling despite herself. This brought Heiji's attention back to her. "Where are we?"

"This man, this Westerner, he brought you here. He said his name was the Doctor, and he seemed to know you."

Heiji ran his fingers through his hair, brow furrowing in confusion when he found it not as straight as it used to be. "Yes... Yes, I think I remember that. So many questions; he knew everything. Before that, I was shot. Between that..." he stopped, remembering. There was silence. Finally, "I wasn't lying you know."

"Lying?" Kazuha asked, knowing exactly what he was talking about but pretending not to.

"Lying." Heiji repeated. "I wasn't. I almost told you so many times, and then I finally did. I wasn't lying."

"Are you lying now?" Kazuha asked. "You've changed. How do I know you're not lying now?"

Heiji nodded distractedly. "Yes. I have changed. And I think I'm a little braver too."

"Braver?"

Heiji swung himself off the bed and started advancing on Kazuha with all due haste. "I love you. I love you I love you I love you I love you."

"Shut up!" Kazuha shouted, backing towards the wall. "Who are you?"

"I love you I love you. I love you," he said, grabbing her arm. He pulled her into a fierce, passionate kiss. "I love you I love you," he kept repeating between kisses.

"Heiji!" Kazuha protested. "Get off!" She tried to fight him, but he was too strong. She was just starting to give up when the door to the Infirmary slammed open.

"HATTORI! _What the hell do you think you're doing?_"

Kazuha took advantage of Heiji's momentary bewilderment to push him away from her. Heiji stumbled slightly, looking at the livid Conan. "Conan-kun?"

"Other Conan," Conan replied.

"I'm out of here!" Kazuha shouted. "I'd rather face Cybermen out there than whatever the hell's in here!" She brushed past Conan and slammed the door behind her.

"Where is she going?" Heiji asked in a quiet voice.

Conan decided to take him to task. "She's leaving, you heard her! It's quiet out there right now, but who knows when she'll run into a Cyberman! She'll die and it'll be all your fault, you bastard! If you hadn't just _died_, I'd kill you again myself!"

Heiji sprinted past Conan, swearing under his breath.

* * *

The Doctor, Donna, and Saguru reentered the TARDIS after successfully defeating the Cybermen. At the same time, Kazuha entered from the hall door. Spotting the Doctor, she marched right up to him. "Throttle? _Throttle?_ Forget it!" She charged right by them and out the still open door, shutting it with a bang.

"Oh dear." The Doctor started walking fast around the console. Just as he reached the door to the rest of the ship, it came open and Heiji flew into his arms.

"Where is she?" he asked, panicked. "She's going to get killed! I've got to stop her!"

The Doctor grabbed him and held on tight. "No, shh, it's okay. Don't worry. The Cybermen are gone. They won't hurt her."

Conan sprinted in. "What's going on?"

"The Cybermen have been defeated. What about in here?"

Conan took one look at Heiji, who wasn't calming down. "Let's not get into that right now."

The Doctor kept his grip on Heiji. "You need rest. I think the Zero Room would be a good idea right now."

"But Kazuha-"

"Will be just fine," the Doctor cut him off. "Heiji, listen to me. The Cybermen have been defeated. They're gone. Kazuha's a smart girl, she'll be all right."

Heiji hiccuped. Conan blinked. He hiccuped again. This time Saguru blinked. He continued to hiccup.

"Zero Room. Now."

* * *

Tokyo was different now. Kazuha was reminded oh so slightly of all those monster movies where, happy ending or not, the city still got trashed. She wandered aimlessly, the streets practically empty, most sane people still hiding inside. Was this a happy ending?

She shook her head, not no, but to get rid of the thoughts. It would be better not to dwell on that for the moment. Better to let it simmer. Yes. Simmering was good.

"Kazuha-chan!"

She turned around at the noise as a red car pulled up next to her. She recognized the driver as a Tokyo police officer, Sato Miwako, and saw that Ran was sitting in the back. She had been the one to shout. "Ran-chan!" Kazuha smiled. Familiar faces were good, even if they had no idea what was going on.

Ran smiled widely with relief. "I was so worried about you and Hattori-kun! You weren't at the restaurant when I got there and then all the chaos started. Where is Hattori-kun? Right in the middle of everything I'm sure."

"I... I don't actually know where he is, Ran-chan," Kazuha lied, from a certain point of view. "We got separated."

Ran fortunately enough mistook confusion for worry. "I'm sure he'll turn up," she condoled. "Hop in, Detective Sato is giving me a ride back to the agency."

"Always glad to help," Sato said, speaking for the first time. "Don't worry Kazuha-chan. Hattori-kun's tough as nails. He'll be fine."

Kazuha just about burst into tears and relayed the whole story right then and there. "Thank for the ride," was what she actually said as she got into the car.

"No problem."

And Kazuha wondered how they could possibly be so calm when the world had just fallen apart.

* * *

**Okay, how many people thought that 's' on the end of 'hearts' was a typo? How many read a bit more and went, "Wait..."? Um, basically was thinking about how Heiji gets his dark skin from his grandfather even though he's darker than both his parents. This somehow morphed into him getting his random physical traits from his grandfather, which, well, exploded. A prime example of twisting canon to suit my needs. And no, those are not Pete's World Cybermen. Those are Mondas Cybermen, the original Cybermen. I've probably mutilated them horribly but there you go. The Zero Room is also Original Series, and is apparently a room that blocks all telepathic communication or something, so that newly regenerated Time Lords can calm down without outside interference. I think it was actually destroyed, but... shush you.**

**Next chapter or two will probably take place in Osaka and be dealing with the aftermath. That should be angstily fun! Reviews, as always, are love!**


	12. Time Lords of Osaka

**Time Lords of Osaka**

**Timeframe: Directly after previous chapter.**

**Summary: Minimizing the damage is on Heiji's mind. It's not going well.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Detective Conan.**

**Notes: Okay, this one's a little short, but that's because Part 3 is getting away from me. I'm at five pages and it's only slowly coming to a close. Basically I thought up Part 1 first but then wrote Part 2 first so it may seem like there's a slight disconnect between them. Anyway, allons-y!**

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* * *

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Shizuka heard the front door open from the kitchen. Curious as to who it might be, she set down the platter she had been drying and poked her head into the hallway. She frowned, not recognizing the person slipping out of their shoes. But then he looked up. "I'm home, Mom," he said quietly.

Shizuka was hugging her son in an instant. "Oh my god Heiji, it's you! I can't believe it! I thought... maybe..." She pulled back to get a good look at him. She flicked at a stray bit of hair. "Well, it could be worse. Two arms, two legs, twenty fingers and toes in all I assume." She pulled him close again. "We were so worried! Your father's been absolutely beside himself, though of course he won't admit it."

Heiji tried to wriggle out of her grasp. "You can stop crying now Mom, I'm fine."

"Of course I can't Heiji, we thought you were dead! We thought you'd been turned into one of those things, those monsters. I was waiting at the train station for you and Kazuha-chan and then she showed up without you..." Shizuka smiled sadly. "She knows, doesn't she?"

Heiji nodded. "Yeah. She knows."

"No wonder she's been avoiding me. I hope you can set things right with her Heiji."

Heiji nodded. "I met one of them though," he said, changing the subject. "He helped me."

"Really?" Shizuka seemed overjoyed. "Is it...?"

Heiji shook his head. "No, it's not him. But it is one of them. And he said," here Heiji gulped, "He said that if things don't work out, I or both of us are welcome to go with him. But they're going to work out, right?" When Shizuka didn't answer, Heiji glared. "You told him, right? Tell me you told him."

"Sorry, Heiji."

Heiji's hand met his forehead. "Oh, so when this mess started you didn't think to say, 'Oh, Heiji might be all right, he might just be hiding somewhere discovering his heritage' or something like that?"

"Well..."

"Shizuka, I'm home." Both spun around. Hattori Heizo, fresh from work, stood in the doorway. He pointed at Heiji. "Shizuka, who is this boy?"

Heiji folded his arms, trying not to let that get at him. "I am _not_ helping you clean up this mess that is entirely your fault. I am _not_."

"You could have told him too you know."

"We both know that you were the only one who could have ever told him. That is, if we wanted to minimize damage and shouting which I must say, we are doing a rather excellent job of not doing at the moment."

"Shizuka, who is this boy?" Heizo almost growled.

"Dear," Shizuka said, wavering slightly, "this is Heiji."

Heizo, to his credit, didn't even blink. "Not even mentioning the more obvious things, I have heard my son speak in a Tokyo accent. It is not a pleasant sound, if he can manage it at all."

"Dear, this is Heiji," Shizuka repeated. "There's... there's something I haven't told you. I'll tell you everything now, but this is Heiji."

Heiji started to wander towards the door. "I'll just leave you two to it, shall I?"

Shizuka grabbed the back of his shirt. "Oh no you don't young man. You're staying right here."

"Your mess!" Heiji justified.

"Which involves you!" Shizuka shot back. She then looked back at Heizo. "Dear, do you remember a girl from a long time ago? It was very early on in your police career. She pushed you out of the way, taking a bullet for you, and then staggered off. You never saw her again. You looked and looked but you never found her."

Heizo gaped, stunned. "I never told you about that. Never."

"But she found you. She wanted to know what kind of person the man she'd saved was. It turned out that the man had a good heart, and she decided that she wanted to make sure it stayed that way. So she stayed with you, and she's still here."

Heizo stared at Shizuka for a few tense moments. "You're unbalanced," he finally said slowly, as if he was trying to justify everything within the confines of what his mind could comprehend. "You've been acting strange ever since Heiji died. You've lost it Shizuka, clearly-"

"No!" Shizuka shouted. "Hattori Heizo, listen to me!" She took a deep breath. "I lied to you. I'm sorry, but now I admit it. I lied to you. I was scared of what would happen if you knew the truth. And I know that there were so many times I could have told you, that I should have told you, but I didn't because I was scared. And as time wore on it seemed less and less important until finally I thought that maybe I could get away with never telling you at all. But now it's being waved in my face that I can't get away with that, and that I need to tell you the truth now."

She paused, taking another deep breath. "There's these aliens. These aliens, they're called Time Lords. They look like humans, I think. Or at least some of them do. I don't actually know all that much about them, he left when I was only three. Called away to some war his people were involved in, that's what he said. He said he'd come back, but he never did."

"Shizuka, what are you talking about?"

"The thing about these aliens though is when they die they don't actually die!" Shizuka finished quickly. "They change instead," she added quietly.

"So you're saying," Heizo said evenly, slowly, finger rising, "That you're one of those... things, those aliens." The finger slowly moved. "And that he's one of them too. And that you are her, and he is Heiji. You're both those aliens that keep coming, that keep doing things to Earth."

"Not Time Lords, never Time Lords," Shizuka protested. "They're good people! My father was a good person!"

"They're not people!" Heizo roared, finally showing his rage. "Humans are people! Those aliens, those things, they're not people!"

"Dad, I-"

"_You are not my son!_ My son is Heiji, my son is human, my son would never dream of going along with this nonsense! My utterly human son wins kendo matches, thinks he's a detective, and speaks Osaka-ben! You are not my son!"

"Dear, listen to me-"

"I did listen to you! And you spouted nonsense! Utterly ridiculous nonsense! Where is your proof? Where is your proof that my whole life has been a lie?"

Heiji gulped. "Actually there's one of them outside. He's uh, waiting in his ship. His spaceship. He's waiting to know if I want to come with him or not."

"Go join him then!" Heizo shouted. "Go join him and run around doing alien things! Just get out! Both of you!"

Shizuka put her hands on her hips. "I am not going anywhere until I can make you see sense! Heiji, why don't you go find Kazuha-chan? This is going to get ugly!"

"Oh, so she's in on this too is she?"

"No she's not!" Heiji shouted, furious. "No one knew! No one! And now Kazuha's too busy hating me to be in on it!"

"Well then at least that makes two of us still sane," Heizo growled.

"You know what?" Heiji asked, striding towards the door. "I'm out of here. Mom," he paused his steps, "If this doesn't end well, you're coming with me. There's plenty of room." He slammed the front door behind him.

* * *

She saw him in the distance, waiting for her. He undoubtedly was, standing in the middle of the sidewalk and staring at her as he was. She sped up, hoping to pass and ignore him.

It wasn't to be. "Wait," he ordered calmly, his tone far from the insane ramblings that she'd last heard out of his mouth. Even though she could have easily kept going, she found herself stopping. "Thank you."

"What do you want?" she asked, trying not to let the tears show.

"Just to talk," he replied.

She turned to look at him. "What on earth do we have to talk about?"

He chuckled wryly. "Nothing. Nothing we have to say has anything to do with Earth. But we do each have things to say."

"Ahou," she said slowly, swiping at him with her book bag. He didn't duck, instead letting it hit him full force. She winced at that, knowing that he now knew that she had pulled her punch.

They stared at each other in silence. Finally he spoke. "How are things going?"

"Everyone thinks you're dead," she replied bluntly. "You never showed up again, and so many bodies were impossible to identify. They all think you're one of them. And they all expect me to be sad that you're dead, even though you're really not, but it's too easy because in a way you really are dead, and I'm so confused." She finally started crying. He pulled her into a hug, and both were surprised when she didn't object. "Oh Heiji. What're we going to do?"

He was surprised at the plural 'we', but didn't show it. "This is actually my second stop. I popped by home first. Mom was overjoyed of course. That and panicking a little, she wasn't exactly expecting it to happen so soon. She alternated between talking about how proud she was of me and worrying over what we were going to do next. Then..." he trailed off, getting lost in recent bitter memories.

Kazuha knew him well enough though. She thought. "Your dad," she stated.

Heiji nodded. "Yeah. Then he came home from work. He, ah, didn't take the news so well."

"He'd rather you were dead?" Kazuha prodded with a small bit of incredulity.

"Oh he hadn't even gotten to that part yet by the time I left." Heiji winced. "He was still stuck on the part where his wife and son aren't entirely human."

Kazuha glared, somehow falling back into not so old habits. "You mean he didn't even know? What. Were. You. Thinking?"

"Hey, Mom was the one that decided not to tell him in the first place," Heiji argued back. He ran a hand through his hair in stress, still frowning at the slight curls. "Anyway, if things don't blow over nicely at home, I may have to leave for a while."

"You've been gone," Kazuha pointed out. "For a week."

"I'm talking about longer than that," Heiji explained as if Kazuha was an idiot. "I'm talking about another month at best, as long as it takes the old man to cool down. Maybe a couple months. Maybe several. Maybe a year. Who knows."

"Heiji messed up big time," Kazuha taunted.

"It's not my fault!" Heiji nearly shouted back. He calmed quickly though. "I'll call. I'll definitely try to remember to call. Anyway, I've got to go now. See if Dad's kicked Mom out yet."

"You seem awfully sure that that's what's going to happen."

"You didn't hear him earlier. Anyway, see you later!" He started to walk off, hands in his pockets.

"Wait." He stopped, turning. "Where do we stand?" Kazuha asked, slightly scared.

Heiji smiled softly. "You know exactly how I feel about you. Dad's not the only person I'm waiting for to come around."

And then he was gone. Kazuha smiled. Yes, a little break would be nice. Time to think things over, and then a phone call to discuss them. Yes, that sounded nice.

* * *

**So! Part 3 should be coming soon, tying up the vast majority of the Time Lord!Heiji arc. There may be a few more loose ends after that ("Oi, Kudo!" About face "WHUT?"), but that'll be mostly it. The thing about Part 3 though is that it may not be the next chapter because I post these in the order I finish them and I just made a breakthrough on my Ekoda chapter. But anyway, reviews are love, be back soon!**


	13. Ekoda Intermission

**Ekoda Intermission**

**Summary: Kaito is taken in by Clarke's Law hook, line, and sinker.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Magic Kaito, Detective Conan, or Doctor Who.**

**

* * *

**

Kaito Kid is not a thief.

Okay, he knows what it looks like. But that's only because his successor knows about 1.2% of the whole story. Magic glowy rocks indeed. Was he really that thick? How did he think he got a _car_ into the secret room in the first place? Why didn't he ever bother to wonder why no one noticed an entire _room_ was missing from the house?

Okay, he understands the confusion. Clarke's Third Law, sufficiently advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic and all that. But he had started to teach Kaito how to tap into the Rift before he died. So therefore Kaito should know that things are not as they seem. Okay, so he had never actually explained what the Rift was, but surely Kaito knew that there was no such thing as real magic. Right?

Right?

Oh dear. This could get ugly.

He had started out so honorable too. Hoarding away the alien flotsam and jetsam so that no stupid people would get a hold of it and accidentally blow them all to kingdom come. But then several other people got wise to what was going on, and started hoarding it themselves for nefarious purposes. Either that or they just saw something and thought it was shiny so they put it in a glass box for the world to see. So he became not so honorable but still more or less honorable.

Eventually someone pieced together what he was doing, and his real identity. That was when things went funny, and not the hah-hah kind either. So now Kaito was bouncing around stealing pretty rocks while using his innate telepathic abilities to utilize the Rift in his tricks thinking it was real magic, searching for an alien rejuvenation machine thinking it was a magic glowy rock, and avoiding getting shot at by some idiots who thought the same. Oh, things were so messed up he was rolling over in his grave.

But overall Toichi just wished that Yusaku would stop _laughing_ and explain everything to Kaito already.

* * *

**Essentially Ekoda is the center of a rift in time and space, Toichi patrolled it, and Yusaku was in on the whole thing. And thinks Kaito is funny in his obliviousness. Oh yeah.**


	14. Time and Space and Shizuka

**Time and Space and Shizuka**

**Timeframe: Season 4, after Time Lords of Osaka.**

**Summary: ****As Shizuka runs across time and space, she remembers. And does her best to keep the home answering machine full.**

******Disclaimer: Don't own Detective Conan or Doctor Who.**

******Notes: Jo Grant makes a very brief appearance. For those that don't know, the reason the Doctor was miffed was because at the end of an adventure Jo randomly decided to get married to and go explore the Amazon with a man that she described as a younger version of the Doctor. Ouch.**

* * *

She is running away from the blue-skinned tentacled policeman, his brown mustache quivering as he shouts unintelligibly in rage. Apparently their tour guide has just committed some sort of cultural faux pas, and now the entire tour is paying for it (he rather wishes she would stop referring to it as that, but when you've got five mostly humans being led around the universe by an alien clearly it's a tour). Of course their guide did so much in the span of a minute, she isn't actually sure which part was the faux pas. Either way they're running now, back to the blue box, back to safety, that wonderful ship that chimes in her head and sings songs of joy when she's on board. Her eyes meet with her son's and his grin matches her own. He loves this, this mad existence, and she wishes he could have met his grandfather. She wishes he could have stayed longer.

She remembers running before, through the rain. There's no time to look left or right as she crosses the street like her mother always told her. She's busy knocking that man over, that policeman, as a searing pain rips through her body. She knows that she is dead, that she is dying, and that she has to get away. That's all her mother told her, all her mother knew. The policeman stares at her in shock as she pushes herself up and staggers off. She hopes the blood trail won't lead him to her because she can't let anybody see her. She can't let anybody know the secret that she's been forced to keep.

* * *

She is hunting through the dank dungeon, looking for her traveling companions. Clearly their tour guide is very good at pissing off those in high places, because this is where everyone has ended up. Everyone except her, because apparently this lord or viscount or whatever he is has a fondness for human women, and Donna's mouth was too big for him. After a few well-placed lies she has managed to get into the dungeon whilst carrying the sonic screwdriver, and now she's looking to get them all out of there. When she finally finds them her son is leaning against the wall looking bored out of his mind, as if the novelty of getting thrown into a dungeon wore off way too long ago. She has to wonder if this is actually good for him.

She remembers trying to figure out how to find the policeman again when the perfect opportunity drops into her lap. Her apartment is robbed, and the very man she wants to find is then standing in her living room. They strike up a conversation, and she is satisfied with what she has done.

* * *

She is lounging in the library next to the swimming pool reading a history text. A bit redundant in a time machine yes, but this is of the one planet they can't visit, and incidentally the one she wants to visit the most. She is just getting to the part about the invention of time travel when she hears a voice coming from in between the shelves. Bookmarking the book, she sets it aside and investigates. She finds her son talking into his cell phone, telling someone of their adventures. She can guess who it is easily enough. She smiles and retreats. He has given her an idea.

She remembers walking into her apartment with groceries just as the phone is ringing. She drops them and sprints to the phone, practically throwing it against her ear. After a few minutes conversation, she somehow ends up being offered a date with a police officer. Why versus why not have a quick battle in her head and next Saturday she finds herself in a relatively nice restaurant opposite the man she saved who has no idea that she did so. Dinner ends well. They decide to do it again.

* * *

_"Heizo, it's Shizuka. Today we went to Bantora, absolutely beautiful. Apparently a hundred __years ago there was some great ecological disaster that practically destroyed the planet's surface, so __the inhabitants raised their mountains out of the ground and now the cities are just floating mountains hovering above this absolutely gorgeous mist. Deadly, but gorgeous. The swirls-"_

"Message Deleted."

* * *

Now she's attending a wedding. Apparently the Doctor was invited an incredibly long time ago, but had since forgotten entirely for reasons he never quite fully delved into. The bride didn't actually seem to recognize any of them, so it must have been a while. They sat in the back of the church, and later at the reception the bride walked over and politely demanded to know who the hell they all were and if they were connected to the Doctor because she'd definitely seen the TARDIS. The Doctor said something about a slice of wedding cake being left for him, which was redundant as the cake was absolutely huge, and she pulled him into a hug. Her husband seems a bit jealous when he sees them dancing, but after some explanation he's fine with it.

She remembers the night before her own wedding, the worry, the indecision over whether to tell him or not. She knows that she should. She knows that she should tell him while he still has a chance to back out. But she doesn't want to tell him because she loves him too much and she doesn't want him to back out. And in the end, when they're a married couple, he's still clueless.

* * *

_"Heizo, it's Shizuka again. Today upon Heiji's insistence we went to meet Frederic Dannay and Manfred B. Lee, but the Doctor got it a bit off. It was entertaining to say the least watching Heiji hang out with two boys his age who will grow up to be his favorite mystery writers, and trying not to say anything about it. He-"_

"Message Deleted."

* * *

Next they visit a planet with an absolutely horrible mortality rate. Along with everyday dangers there is also a dreadful disease that ravages the inhabitants, and mysterious beasts that kill and eat anyone out after dark. As a result the inhabitants have an enormous birthrate, and they meet a wonderful yet unlucky woman who is on her fourth husband and has had twenty-one children, thirteen of which are still alive. As usual the disease turns out to be the fault of some megalomaniac villain, and the beasts which rather resemble really large wolves with spiked clubs on the end of their tails turn out to be his minions. They depose the villain, the wolf-things turn out to be actually rather nice and were being mind-controlled, and they reassure the inhabitants that things should be looking up now. But Shizuka still remembers the sad look on that poor woman's face, the one with the three dead husbands and eight dead children.

She also remembers, after rather a lot of pain (there is a _reason_ Heiji is an only child), being handed a small bundle and smiling at the absolutely tiny life within. Taking a finger and caressing gently that soft, small cheek. Holding him close and feeling the healthy beats of two hearts and knowing, deep down, that she should have told him before it came to this. She really, really should have told him, but now she can't bring herself to. Not now, not when something is actually at stake. Not when the future of her little baby boy is at stake. Later she'll tell him. Yes, later. Later, after some skillful probing to try and gauge how he'll take the news. After the future of her little boy is less at stake. Later.

* * *

_ "Hi Heizo, it's me again. Nothing much happened today. Well, the Doctor started another revolution, but that's... well, normal for him. It's strange how fast you get used to these sorts of things around here. I suppose... Well anyway, Heiji's doing fine. I've been trying to make him keep up with his studies, but it isn't easy. Not with distraction all over the place. 'Sorry, I can't study calculus!' he shouts, 'I've got to save the princess of Gacnek from her uncle's assassin!' And the Doctor is certainly aiding and abetting his excuses. He must have been horrible when he was in school._

_ "Well anyway, just calling to see how you're doing. Probably fine, I guess. Hah, look at me. I'm almost always surrounded by people and yet I feel so lonely. I miss you, Heizo. I wish I could come back, I really do. Please call. Goodbye."_

"...Message Deleted."

* * *

Kazuha lounged on her bed, legs waving in the air as she listened to the person on the other end. _"...And then we weren't on the tracks anymore, we were flying through the air. You should have seen the look on Mom's face! I don't think I'm ever going to be able to convince her to go on a ride at an alien theme park ever again."_

Kazuha laughed. "You know, I don't know whether to believe half the things you say."

_"It turned out we were on the tracks the whole time, and it was just a holographic display. And then there was a bomb on the merry-go-round... bit of industrial espionage, and I could see why. That place is too successful for its own good! But never mind that, how are things in Osaka?"_

Kazuha rolled over to sit up and lean against the wall. "Same old same old. Except I'm pretty sure Dad suspects something."

_"Suspects what? He could be suspecting all kinds of things at this point."_

"That's the thing, I don't know. But I think he's been trying to listen in on my phone calls, and I'm pretty sure he's searched my room."

_"Ookaaayy... Has he said anything to you? Asked strange questions?"_

"No, but I've caught him looking at me funny a couple times."

_"That's it! You're not being sad enough. Your best friend died recently and his body was never recovered. Start crying!"_

Kazuha laughed again. "Heiji you're impossible!" She stopped though, serious again. "Seriously though, what are we going to do if he finds out? What do I tell him?"

_"Your dad's brain is only a little bit more open than mine. He'll never come up with the truth on his own."_

"Honestly I don't think anyone could come up with the truth on their own. But I may end up having to tell him something, if he gets pushy."

_"Tell him I'm with Kudo. Kudo vanished out of the blue too, right? So tell him I had to go help Kudo with his case, and it's top secret."_

"Yeah, and then Kudo-kun shows up without you and completely ruins the whole thing by being clueless."

_"In which case I lied to you."_

"You do know he'd start hating you if it came to that," Kazuha replied quietly.

_"Yeah. But that's okay, because unless he finds out the whole truth he's never going to meet Hattori Heiji again."_

Kazuha sighed. "Yes. I suppose you're right."

_"Anyway, I've got to go now. We've been laying low for the past few days because the brat caught some sort of alien virus and was covered in blue spots. He's feeling better now, but the Doctor's still loathe to let him out of the TARDIS. So we're going to go somewhere nice and calm. Hah."_

"And we all know how that will end. Bring me back something when you finally come home, okay? I miss you."

_"Miss you too. Bye."_ The phone beeped at Kazuha as the call disconnected. She stood up and set the phone next to her unfinished math homework. Oh, but was she jealous.

* * *

The TARDIS has got something wrong with her again, so they've landed at an alien bazaar and the Doctor has turned them all loose while he tries to fix her. The boys have wandered off to do their own thing and Donna found a space pirate to flirt with, so Shizuka has found herself wandering the stalls alone, inspecting the alien wares and generally being awed at what she sees. As she's holding a scarf of some incredibly soft, alien fabric up to her cheek, she is jostled by a strange man running down the narrow walkway. He pauses and turns around to apologize, and she thinks that he looks familiar, maybe just a little. He smiles widely as he catches her face and tells her that she's wonderful, before vanishing into the crowd again. It happens so quickly that she doesn't get to say a word to him, but somehow she thinks that she doesn't need to.

"Hello dear. We actually had a quiet day today. I bought a scarf, and it's the softest thing I've ever owned. A man bumped into me at the bazaar and told me I'm wonderful. You'd better hurry up and call back before I'm distracted! Heiji is doing fine, though he is meeting far too many alien princesses for my liking. Donna was nearly kidnapped by a space pirate, but she showed him who's boss. Anyway, I'm getting tired of waiting so if you don't call I may come back soon. Love you. Bye."

* * *

He remembers, all his life, seeking approval from this man he calls his father. When he wins his first kendo tournament, he looks over to the stands to see his mother clapping enthusiastically and his father just staring on. When he deducts his first crime and sticks that first criminal behind bars, he glances in his direction but he isn't even looking at him. And he thinks he must know, instinctively, that something's not right. That there's something strange about him, something inhuman. He thinks his mother is an idiot for not saying anything, but he keeps quiet about it. After all, once he gets older he can almost understand her reasoning. Almost. It's the same reasoning that kept him from telling Kazuha any number of things over the years. The reasoning of the fear of rejection, that one thing that all humans fear at least a little. If she had told him and he had accepted it, he can't think of any way that things would have significantly changed. But if he hadn't accepted the truth, then he would most likely have ended up the child of a struggling single parent.

(All his life Heiji has done his best to stay away from science fiction. As much as he has tried to convince himself that this would never have happened, he can't help but twitch whenever the alien is taken away to the secret government lab.)

All his life he sought an approval that was never given. So even though the eventual rejection of being told that he is not his son cuts through him like a knife, he knows that now at least he has an answer to a yes or no question, and that dulls the ache a little as he flees across the stars.

* * *

Rrriiinnnggg... Rrriiinnnggg... Rrriiin- "Hello?" Shizuka answered, slightly breathless. No one ever called her phone. She'd leapt for it in shock.

_"Hey, it's... me."_

One of her hearts skipped a beat. "Oh... Hi. It's nice to hear from you." She pauses, unsure of what to say. "How are things going?"

_"Okay, I guess. Is it beautiful?"_

"Pardon?" she asks, wondering if she heard him right.

_"Is it beautiful? Space, I mean."_

She smiled softly. "Yeah. Yeah it is."

There was a pause, silence, neither really knowing what to say to the other. _"Um... Call again sometime. Tell Heiji he'd better stay away from those alien princesses because Kazuha-chan's waiting for him."_

"I will. I'll call to tell you about everything. I promise."

Shizuka didn't get much time alone with her thoughts before getting dragged off on another adventure, but she found she didn't mind.

* * *

They're sitting on the very edge, their legs dangling outside the blue doors. In front of them colors swirl as the star dies in a brilliant burst of light. He clings slightly to the edge, but she has no fear of falling. "I'm glad you agreed to come and see this," she says, leaning her head on his shoulder.

"It is... quite beautiful," he admits. That is an understatement. He has never before seen anything like it; the impressive colors are greater than any fireworks display.

They have a few more minutes of solitude before they are interrupted by bickering teenagers. Saguru is complaining about something again, to which Heiji replies, "You're just jealous that all four of the quadruplet princesses liked me better." He tells Saguru he's got a stick shoved up his ass, at which point it degenerates into a full-blown argument with a side of name-calling. Conan tries to settle them down, but only gets ends up getting involved himself when Saguru brings up a bird-like alien that was trying to set up arranged marriages for her chicks and decided that he was just the right size to carry off.

Heiji takes the lull in Saguru's attention on him to grin at his parents, who smile back. He knows that he's going to go home soon. And while he loves the running and he'll miss it, there's really no place like home.

* * *

**And thus concludes the Time Lord!Heiji arc. And now back to your regularly scheduled oneshots. Sidenote: The culture of the bird alien that kidnapped Conan is that the parents go around kidnapping each others chicks and bringing them to their own nests and pairing that chick up with one of their own. That particular mother decided that Conan was either an easy target, or a nice macho man to give her strong grandchildren. Whether or not he is now technically married under Bird Alien Law is entirely up to what you think. Reviews are love?**


	15. Time and Space and Visiting Tokyo

**Time and Space and Visiting Tokyo**

**Summary: Heiji gets dragged up to Tokyo. He and Conan end up discussing lies, blackmail, fear, and Spock.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Doctor Who or Detective Conan.**

**Notes: First off, I can't believe this is chapter fifteen. It sort of snuck up on me. Second off, I lied about being done with Heiji. And finally thirdly, LeonaWriter is amazing for drawing such wonderful crossover art and reviewing all the chapters. kari910, AEC1990, Hori Midorkawa, James Birdsong, Moon Ecstasy, SilverHai-chan, Kasumi Hoshi Nishida, Aslook, Umiyuri Papaeyra, crazy queen of toast, Astarael's Get, Firehedgehog, Miyanoai, yolapeoples, and WolfDaughter get honorable mentions. The rest of you suck. I won't bite! I promise! Just review, please! I know you're there!**

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* * *

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And here they were. Standing here, staring each other down. Heiji cursed silently. This was all Ran's fault for inviting Kazuha to Tokyo. It was all Kazuha's fault for agreeing, and dragging him with. It was all his fault for agreeing. It was the fault of the myriad people whose actions had led to him staring Conan down in the park alone. Oh, who was he kidding? It was all Fate's fault, and Lady Luck's fault, and Murphy's Law's fault, and Kaito Kid's fault. Because really, Heiji wouldn't put it past Kaito Kid to be involved in this _somehow_.

"Who are you?"

And Heiji cursed silently some more.

* * *

Hattori Heizo hadn't even been gone from Osaka for a day. Shizuka however had been gone for quite a bit longer than that, and Heiji was sort of technically dead. So it turned out that Shizuka had been in the States taking care of the estate of a recently deceased relative, and had brought back with her her recently orphaned nephew. And so Ikenami Heiji came into existence. This ended up being far easier than it would have been otherwise, because the Doctor had connections with, well, everybody who ever mattered ever.

So Heiji and Shizuka packed up their stuff, Heizo gained a new world view, and Kazuha enjoyed her new designer purse from the Lorentian System. Meanwhile Saguru was glad that they'd finally gotten rid of the idiot-who-turned-out-to-be-an-alien, Conan was a little sad to see them go, Donna and Shizuka traded phone numbers, and the Doctor was secretly happy that there'd be no more angry kings wondering why their daughters were throwing themselves at one of his crew. He definitely hadn't pulled Heiji aside and handed him a ring embedded with a white point star, telling him that it was for when the time came, and Heiji most certainly hadn't accepted it with the comment that perhaps the Doctor was jumping the gun a little.

Things eventually settled down, at least a little. Heiji managed to get into his old classroom, Kazuha was overjoyed that he was back, and Commissioner Toyama was clearly suspicious about something, not that Heiji blamed him.

Then Ran had decided to invite Kazuha to Tokyo. Something about a friend in need, having fun and taking her mind off of things, and just generally skirting around the topic of Heiji's supposed death. She had agreed and, bringing up "Heiji's cousin from America", managed to get him an invite too.

Heiji had started out leery. Then he'd remembered the brat – the real one, not that paradox-thing-he-didn't-even-know brat – and realized that this was quite possibly the worst idea anyone's ever had. Too bad Kazuha wasn't listening. It probably helped that she thought he really was just a brat and not Kudo Shinichi of the East, and that there was nothing between them except Conan really liking hanging out with his cool Heiji-niichan So Heiji had taken a deep breath and reminded himself that if he did this right, he would come out of it with only a few scratches.

Long story short, he didn't do it right. First off Kazuha had kept whispering things to him that she wouldn't have if he really was who he said he was. And then he kept acting too familiar with the Mouris, and treating Conan as more than just an ordinary boy. And then Ran had called Kazuha out on her good mood, and she'd pulled out a passable lie for Ran but certainly not for Conan. And when Conan had sighed sadly at the sight of Ran and Kazuha laughing, Heiji barely refrained from glaring at him and telling him that _he was right there damn it_ so to stop looking like his best friend died.

He had finally given up on trying to emerge from this unscathed, and set his new, much more likely goal at avoiding being alone with Conan. Unfortunately there's a different between likely and definite, no matter how much more likely, and the girls had abandoned the two of them at the park. Kazuha, naturally oblivious to the whole situation, had completely ignored the looks he was sending her and wandered off with Ran, leaving Heiji and Conan alone in a secluded part by a bench. Leading to the current situation of Conan building up to interrogation mode and Heiji panicking ever so slightly.

* * *

"Who are you?"

The taller boy laughed shakily, scratching the back of his neck. "What are you talking about? I'm-"

"I know who you said you were. But you and Kazuha-neechan are acting strange together. Who are you really? Are you one of Them?"

"Okay, stop right there," he insisted, completely serious. "Kudo, I give you my word of honor that I'm not."

Cue panicked look on the younger boy's face. The older boy smacked his own. Shit, he'd done it again. "How. Do. You. Know?" the younger boy growled, face darkening. "You are one of Them, aren't you? Vermouth must have told you."

He raised his hands in a passive stance, but his voice gained an edge of its own. "Now first off, when you go into full-on interrogation mode the child act slips more than a little bit. You might want to work on that."

Conan, for that was who he was, suddenly jumped up and clung to the front of the other boy's shirt, trying to look as intimidating as a seventeen-year-old in a seven-year-old's body could. "Who are you?" he demanded again. "Because you're sure as hell not Hattori's cousin, unless he's gone blabbing in which case I'll have to bring him back from the grave just so I can kill him myself!"

Heiji sighed. "Well I suppose since you told me your secret after a little bit of blackmail, it's only fair that I tell you mine. So, what will it be?"

Now Conan was confused. "Huh?"

"How will you blackmail me?" he spelled out.

Conan dropped back down to the floor and assumed a thinking stance. He suddenly looked up. "I'll tell Kazuha-neechan you love her," he said, a mischievous look on his face.

"She already knows," Heiji responded, a smirk taunting Conan.

Conan glared. A few minutes of silence, then, "I'll tell Ran-neechan that Heiji-niisan is an alien in disguise," he finally said sarcastically, throwing his hands up in the air. "Because really, I've got nothing, even though clearly something's up."

"Well clearly you don't even need to be blackmailing me in the first place."

Conan made a sound of confusion. Heiji had to admit, it was the most adorable sound of confusion he'd ever heard Conan make. And now he could practically see the cogs working in his head... and bingo! "What?" came slightly flatly.

Heiji leaned forward, grinning wildly. "You should grasp at straws more often. You have this bizarre tendency to be mostly right."

"_What?_"

Heiji flopped down on the park bench. "My grandfather was an alien," he said simply.

Conan climbed up on to the bench. He was on the other side of the bench, and more than a little bugeyed, but at least he wasn't running away screaming. "If you're pulling my leg, I'm going to hurt you so hard."

Heiji shook his head. "I'm not." Then he looked up at the sky. "Dad wasn't too chuffed about finding out. That's why I had to leave for a while. He eventually came around though."

"So you really are Hattori?" Conan asked, incredulous.

"Yep. It explains how I know who you are, and Kazuha knows which explains how she's treating me."

"It doesn't explain why do you look like that though," Conan gestured.

"Bizarre alien biology," Heiji replied, as if that explained everything ever. "I died, but I didn't. I healed myself, but at the cost of not being me anymore."

"That... sort of makes sense. Not really."

Heiji sighed. "It's called regeneration. Basically every single cell dies and is replaced all at once, effectively healing any damage."

"Doesn't sound too pleasant though."

Heiji grimaced. "It isn't." He glanced back at Conan. The not seven year old was staring at him with a slightly funny look on his face. Not quite acceptance, and definitely not lacking incredulity, but close enough all things considering. Heiji spread his arms wide. "So, Mr. Only One Truth. Do I pass?"

Conan smirked. "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

"That, of course, depends entirely on your definition of impossible."

"You forget another fictional character known for saying that."

"Oh really? Who?"

Conan's grin grew wider. "Spock."

Heiji sighed. "You know I don't like science fiction."

Conan folded his fingers together behind his head. "Oh, I think you'd like Star Trek. At least the newest one." When Heiji's only reply was a raised eyebrow, Conan elucidated. "Your dad mentioned once that you'd never be able to be a real detective because you hate autopsies too much."

Heiji twitched slightly. Conan didn't miss it. "And what exactly are you inferring by that?" he growled.

"Just that, considering the context, you could do worse. While you were gone there was a heist, and the mansion it took place in also happened to have a large aquarium. Somehow the diamond accidentally got dropped in it and Kaito Kid gave up right then and there. At least until we pulled it back out, at which point he went for it again. Then Inspector Nakamori threw it back in with this crazy, unholy grin on his face and Kaito Kid just completely lost his cool. It was kind of funny actually, but overall quite pathetic. There may be a context that justifies it. Who knows, maybe he's deathly allergic to fish. But, context or no context, it's okay to be scared of something."

Heiji sighed. "I know better than to ask you if you're speaking from experience."

Conan smiled at him. "And yet there are still more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy."

"I dunno," Heiji mused, "I think we're getting pretty damn close. Shrinking, criminal organizations, aliens... what's left short of an actual god?"

"You forgot the phantom thief who's afraid of fish," Conan interjected. "Now that's pretty close to being impossible just through sheer ridiculousness."

"You guys are mean," muttered a girl walking by carrying an ice-cream cone.

The two detectives stared at the retreating back as it disappeared around a bend. Then they shared a look. More things in heaven and earth indeed.

* * *

"I've _been_ to Vulcan, it doesn't look anything like that!"

"Oh shut up."

"Yeah. Just because you've been around the universe a couple times doesn't make you any smarter than the rest of us."

Ran entered the living room with some drinks and snacks, curious as to the tense atmosphere. "Umm... popcorn anyone?"

* * *

**Vulcan is actually a planet in the Whoniverse. And came into existence within a matter of months of that other Vulcan. I don't know which order though.**

**And because Kaitos can go wherever they damn well want to, so can reviews. Therefore, there is now in place the illusion that they are no longer optional. They are still optional, but I'm using a Jedi Mind Trick to make you think they aren't. You will submit a review *waves hand*.**


	16. Time and Space and Thieves

**Time and Space and Thieves**

**Summary: Snake is hit by a flying bus, Kaito gets a pickup, and Christina is making British jokes.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Magic Kaito or Doctor Who.**

**Notes: Was recently reminded that this was way overdue, of course.**

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**

_Well now I'm fucked._

Kaito thanked his father one last time for Poker Face. He hoped it wasn't actually the last time, but at the moment chances were looking pretty good that it would be. But still. A good smirk never went amiss.

In front of him, Snake cocked his gun. "You're not getting away this time Toichi."

"Yeah, whatever. Not getting away, you're going to kill me, blah blah blah yadda yadda yadda. One track mind much?"

Snake growled. Kaito weighed his options. He was too far away from the edge of the roof to make a run for it, and even if he was close enough it would take some seriously good luck for Snake not to shoot him out of the sky. Right now he really needed to pull a trick out of his sleeve. Problem was, he couldn't think of one.

Wait... was that? No, it couldn't be. Was it?

Poker Face be damned, Kaito felt his jaw drop. It was. Somehow. He wasn't quite sure how, but it was.

Snake mistook his expression for fear. "And now, finally at the end of your life, you show some emotion. I am going to kill you now. Does that scare you?"

"Ummm... no," Kaito managed to scrape together. "Flying bus."

Snake twitched, clearly expecting something to happen. "What?"

"Flying bus. Coming this way."

Snake started laughing maniacally. "Are you really that desperate? To resort to the 'look behind you' trick so poorly? I won't fall for it I tell you! You will need to come up with something better than that to trick me!"

"No really, flying bus, right behind you," Kaito stated, eyes going wider by the second.

Several things happened at once. The flying bus, which Kaito recognized as one of those tall red British things, slammed into the back of Snake. The hitman went flat on his face to the rooftop, screaming about something. And the person driving the bus shouted, "Jump on!" Kaito obliged happily.

He clung to one of the poles as the bus rocketed jerkily into the night. The woman driving it smirked widely at him. "Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded witch, wizard, or magician."

"Is that a British joke?" Kaito asked, trying not to fall over.

The woman laughed and thankfully closed the door so that Kaito didn't have to worry about falling out anymore. "Lady Christina de Souza," she introduced herself.

"Well, it's not often I'm rescued by ladies with flying buses. I'm-"

"Phantom Thief Kid," Christina interrupted him. "Yes, I've heard of you. You did a favor for a friend of mine once. You looked like you were in a bit of a bind so I thought I'd return it."

"I am eternally gracious," Kaito replied, laying it on as much as he could whilst being thrown about by some of the worst driving he'd ever had the misfortune to experience. "But even though I know your name I have no idea who you actually are."

"That friend of mine I mentioned? Chat Noir. She spoke very highly of you after your confrontation."

Kaito nodded. "Ah."

Christina scanned the rooftops below. "Hey, where can I set you down?"

"Any high rooftop will do."

Christina smirked. "That is a wonderfully vague way to answer. You don't trust me."

"To be fair I've only just met you."

"Point. Coming in!"

The landing was, compared to the rest of the short trip, a breeze. Christina opened the door and Kaito stepped away from the flying bus. Now Kaito loved to be off the ground, he really did, but never was he more glad to have his two feet on solid ground. "Thanks for the lift. How does this thing fly anyway?"

Christina shrugged. "I'm not sure I would be able to explain it right. If you see a man in a blue box though ask him. He would be able to."

Kaito smirked. Of course he had something to do with this. "I think I shall. Should I tell him you said hi?"

Christina smirked some more. "No. But if you must tell him I'm wreaking chaos." With that she closed the door and the bus took off into the night.

Kaito smiled as he snapped open his glider. Interesting woman. Interesting bus.

* * *

**Because Kaito _wishes_ he had a flying bus. Reviews s'il vous plait? (Will French work?)**


	17. Time and Space and Goodbyes

**Time and Space and Goodbyes**

**Timeframe: Directly after Series 4 finale.**

**Summary: He never should have taken such an important person from their time stream. He only did it because the person he took told him to.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito.**

**Notes: I had to get this out of the way so I can start writing Series 5 madness. Because it is madness, and I wanted to start writing it. Yay!**

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**

Saguru stepped out of the TARDIS doors, then stopped. "But this is Tokyo. This is Ekoda." He turned around to face the Doctor. "What are we doing here?"

"You're going home," the Doctor said, smiling sadly.

Saguru started striding briskly back towards the TARDIS, but the Doctor barred his way. "No way," Saguru insisted. "I know you're acting the strong hero. I'm not leaving you. Not willingly. You need someone, and everyone else is gone. Rose, Martha, Jack," Saguru paused, gulping, "Donna."

"Saguru, you have to go home," the Doctor insisted back. "I know you don't want to, but the truth of the matter is I never should have allowed you to come with me in the first place."

Saguru shook his head, confused. "No, that's not what you said. You said a future me met a past you and told you that I traveled with you, and that's why you took me with you."

The Doctor nodded. "Yes. And that's the only reason you came in the first place. I've loved traveling with you, I really have, but... you're important. You're so very important here."

Saguru scoffed. "Me? Important? All I do is run around chasing Kaito Kid. Please elucidate how exactly that is important when there is an entire Taskforce dedicated to doing the exact same thing."

"Yes!" the Doctor exclaimed. "That is exactly what you all do. But you're not them and they're not you. They chase, thinking only of the law, but you chase and ask why. You wonder why someone would bounce across rooftops like that short of pure insanity and mental instability. You dig, dig down into the why. And that is why you are important."

"Soo..." Saguru said slowly, still a small bit of confused.

The Doctor grabbed Saguru by the shoulders and shook him slightly. "You are important. You are so important. And that's why you can't travel with me any more. You know what happens to people who travel with me. You are needed here, whole."

"Doctor," Saguru growled, "I'm not letting you leave without me."

"That is why," the Doctor replied slowly, "That I'm not giving you a choice." He reached back inside the TARDIS and pulled out a bag. "Here, I've packed your stuff for you. You know my number, so you can call me if there's an invasion."

Saguru reluctantly took the bag. "And what are you going to do?"

"Oh, I'll just do what I've always done."

"Except you'll be doing it all alone," Saguru argued. "Doctor, you need someone. I know it, you know it, pretty much everyone who's seen you at your worst knows it."

"Saguru, just go. This is already hard enough."

Saguru shook his head. "I won't. I will not leave."

The Doctor stepped into the TARDIS and shut the door behind him. Saguru dropped the bag and ran forward, shoving his key into the lock. It wouldn't turn. "Open up!" he shouted, banging on the door. "Doctor, you need someone to stop you! I've never been all that good at that but please just open up!"

Saguru heard the engines kick in and backed up. He stared as the TARDIS slowly dematerialized from view, and stopped backing up only when he nearly tripped over the bag. "Please don't crash and and burn. The universe needs you," he said quietly once the TARDIS had vanished completely.

"Hakuba-kun! It's you!"

Saguru turned to see Aoko waving, Kaito smirking next to her. The corner of his mouth twitching upwards, he hefted the bag and started walking towards them. Aoko smiled widely and bounced forward. "Where have you been? You just vanished into thin air after that one heist, and no one knew where you were!"

Saguru shrugged for effect. "Oh, just traveling around. You know."

"No, actually, we don't," Kaito replied, also for effect. They shared a quick conversation with their expressions that Aoko completely missed, consisting of many raised eyebrows and "who, me?"s. Then Kaito started imitating the TARDIS sound. Aoko was confused. Saguru wanted to punch him for being so infuriatingly obvious and yet he couldn't do anything about it.

Aoko recovered the situation. "Well me and Kaito were just going to get ice-cream. Would you like to join us?"

Saguru shook his head. "I'd love to, but I should probably go home. I just got back after all."

Kaito grinned. Saguru resisted the urge to throttle him.

"Oh, that's too bad. Maybe some other time," Aoko then started dragging Kaito off. "Bye then! See you soon!"

Saguru waved goodbye, then started to walk in the direction of his house. Something crumpled in his pocket, stopping him. He reached in and pulled it out. Unfolding the piece of paper, he discovered a heist note.

He glared in the direction that Aoko and Kaito had vanished off into, then sighed the sigh of the long-sufferer. He supposed he deserved it for disappearing like that. But that didn't mean that he wasn't going to get his revenge somehow. He pulled out his cell phone. "Ah, Inspector Nakamori sir..."

* * *

**Now just because Saguru is back on Earth doesn't mean this is over. Because it isn't. This will probably never be over. I just needed to set up the angst-laden Specials so that the Doctor can be all "Woe is me!" and break time and such. Because time is fluid, and this thing is making less and less sense as it goes on, but as long as something is properly insane a lack of sense should not be too much of a problem. Reviews please?**


	18. Ekoda Intermission the Second

**Ekoda Intermission the Second**

**Summary: This is the story of the car. Namely, how it got into the secret room.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Magic Kaito or Doctor Who.**

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**

"Blasted thing came out of nowhere!"

"There's no need to be so angry dear."

"I thought I understood the Rift. I thought I could control it at least a little."

"Of course dear."

"_And then it goes and breaks my foot by dumping a fucking car on it!_"

"No swearing dear."

"And now there is a car in my workspace and it's taking up too much room!"

"Can't you get it out dear?"

"No, _it's a car!_ It's not going _anywhere_ unless I create a great big hole in the side of the house and drive it out! There are some things that perception filters just don't cover, and that's one of them!"

"Can't you get it out using the Rift dear?"

"No... maybe. I've never tried anything that big before. Besides, what would I do with it? Its manufacturing date is from a couple years in the future."

"Send it back into the future dear?"

"It landed on my _foot_. I don't _want_ to think about where else it could possibly land. No, the car stays there. For now. Unfortunately."

Seven-year-old Kaito quietly shut the door as he decided that eavesdropping was only useful if one understood what the people being eavesdropped on were talking about. If he were honest with himself, he only ever understood half the things he overheard his parents talking about.

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**X'D**


	19. Time and Space and Bow Ties

**Time and Space and Bow Ties**

**Timeframe: Early Series 5**

**Summary: The Doctor is not mimicking a former companion, he's taking advantage of a good idea. Really.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Doctor Who or Detective Conan.**

**Notes: This is one of those "OMG COINCIDENCE LOVES ME!" situations. And I think it's a brilliant coincidence.**

**

* * *

**"Why do you insist on wearing such dorky clothes?"

Well now. _That_ hadn't come out of the blue. The Doctor looked up at his redheaded companion. "Excuse me?"

Amy sauntered around the console. "Your clothes. They're so dorky. Is there an actual reason, or do you just like looking like an old schoolteacher from the fifties?

"Now Amy," the Doctor chided, fiddling with some knobs and focused on the screen, "These had to be in style at one point or another, otherwise they wouldn't exist."

Amy snorted. "Yeah, like paisley bell-bottoms. In one decade, gone for eternity the next."

The Doctor looked up at her. "That does it, I'm taking you to the forty-third century."

"Will my eyeballs scream in pain?"

The Doctor sighed. "Must you always be like this?"

Amy grinned. "Yep! So. Dorky clothes. Why?"

"I like them. Is that so hard to imagine?"

Amy slowly nodded, wide smile plastered on her face. "Yes."

"It's also hard to imagine someone being executed via drowning in melted hard candy, but it has happened."

Now that got her. "Seriously?"

"Seriously. Now do be kind and push that button. Yes, that one there," the Doctor said as Amy gestured at the button.

She pushed it, and the TARDIS started rocking horribly. Amy grabbed on to the console as the Doctor fiddled with the controls at top speed for several minutes. Finally the TARDIS evened out, and Amy let go. She then continued on in her line of inquiry. "So the dorky clothes are just because you like them, and have nothing to do with a photo I found then."

And that got the Doctor. "Photo? What photo?"

"Well," Amy said, enunciating overdramatically, "While you were looking for the swimming pool a couple days ago, I found a photo in an old, disused room. I guess it must be of another Time Lord or group of Time Lords, because the background looked a little like this thing, but different," she gestured at the center column as she spoke. "Quite a few people in it, and one of them was this kid in a bowtie and suspenders, like you."

"Ahh," the Doctor said. "He's not a kid by the way, he's seventeen."

"Really? Could have fooled me."

"It's a bit of a long story. Anyway, that's not another group of Time Lords. If there's a guy with really messy hair in a brown suit in the picture, that's me. The TARDIS is different because she's had to go through some really extensive repair work since then. It's why I had to leave so suddenly when you were eight, she was having a serious malfunction."

Amy frowned. "Really? It looked smaller on the inside in the picture."

The Doctor frowned, raising an eyebrow. "Really? You're right. Hmmm. I may have to look into that."

Amy came in close, leaning on the console. "So this kid. Who was he and why are you copying his mode of dress?"

"I am not copying it," the Doctor insisted. "I am taking advantage of a good idea."

Amy was not amused, as her raised eyebrow would attest. "And that idea would be what, driving people away by dressing so dorkily?"

"No, actually," the Doctor replied, exasperated. "Part of the long story I mentioned involved some sort of mafia. He needed gadgets for whenever they ran into him and decided to try and kill him again. Very James Bond; have I mentioned how far these stretch out?" the Doctor finished with a question, snapping his suspenders.

"Right. Super stretchy suspenders. And what does the bowtie do?"

"It makes voices," the Doctor said as if imparting a great secret.

"And what does the rest of it do?"

"Well it's not like a bowtie and suspenders go well with paisley bell bottoms now do they?"

"A bowtie and suspenders don't go well with anything, and neither do paisley bell bottoms!"

The Doctor slammed a button. "Forty-third century, coming up!" he shouted as the TARDIS rocked into action.

"Doctor, don't you dare!"

"I am taking you to the forty-third century, at which point you will stop complaining about my clothes!"

And the TARDIS spiraled off through the Vortex towards the forty-third century despite Amy's cries that no, she was not in fact interested in paisley bell bottoms. And she never complained about the Doctor's fashion sense again.

* * *

**I WENT THERE. Oh Amy, you have no idea. Reviews please?**


	20. Time and Space and Ealing

**Time and Space and Ealing**

**Timeframe: The Void. It's just more of Heiji, who tends to be timeframe-less. Sometime before Season 2 of Sarah Jane Adventures, which is really hard to date against Doctor Who. There's a season more than can be matched up. Time travel was probably involved.**

******Summary: Heiji and Sarah Jane spend a couple hours trying to out-maneuver the other, not even realizing that they're on the same side.**

******Notes: Have been satisfying my curiosity concerning the Sarah Jane Adventures. Yes, it's ridiculous. But something can only be so ridiculous before it is awesome in its ridiculousness. There are hypnotized nuns. They make bad jokes concerning the Sound of Music. They had me at "Or we'll show you how _our_ Mother Abbess solves a problem like Maria."**

******

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**

The woman was staring at Heiji again, and it was really starting to weird him out.

By some strange twist of fate, Heiji had ended up in London, Ealing to be precise. His mother had wanted to take a proper family vacation, though what constituted as proper was beyond him, and they'd ended up here. Well, he had at least. His parents were at the moment engrossed in something that thoroughly bored him, and so he'd wandered off to explore a bit on his own. And now the creepy woman was staring at him.

Okay, so she didn't look creepy, but she kept staring at him which was creepy enough. Other than that she seemed like an ordinary mother taking her kid and a couple of friends out on an outing. Two boys and a girl, a couple years younger than he. Having a grand old time of it.

This was ridiculous. If she kept staring at him like that he was going to be paranoid that something was about to happen for the rest of the trip. Best to get over with whatever she was thinking. He walked over towards the small group, waving at them. "Hello there! If you don't mind, I think I'm a bit lost," he called out.

The woman smiled at him, her stare becoming slightly less obvious. "Well we can help. Sarah Jane Smith," she introduced. "This is my son Luke, and his friends Maria and Clyde."

"Heiji Ikenami, nice to meet you," he responded. "I'm looking for a library. One of my friends was insistent before I left that I keep in touch with her." This was true enough. Kazuha was still not letting him out of her sight except under certain circumstances.

"Oh there's one not far from here," Sarah Jane replied. "Luke and his friends can show you the way. Meanwhile I," she checked her watch, "Have to get home, I have some work to do. You three behave," she warned her entourage.

"Oh no, if you just give me directions I can get there on my own."

"Oh I insist. It's easy to get lost around here, even with directions."

The corner of Heiji's mouth twitched upwards. There was something of a challenge in Sarah Jane Smith's words. She was good, innocently sticking him with someone she trusted like that. "It seems you do insist," he responded. "Well I wouldn't want to keep you from your work. What is it that you do?"

"I'm a journalist," Sarah Jane replied.

Heiji nodded knowingly. "Ah. Must be interesting work these days, what with the aliens and such." He studied her closely for a reaction.

Sarah Jane smiled ruefully. "Something like that, yeah."

"Well come on then," the one who must be Clyde said. "The library's this way." The three teens started guiding Heiji off. The one called Luke pulled out his cellphone. He then put it back in his pocket. "What is it?" Clyde asked.

"Just a text," Luke shrugged it off.

Heiji knew better. Before the phone had gone away he had caught the words _not_ and _right_.

* * *

Sarah Jane strode purposefully into the attic. "Mr. Smith, I need you!"

The computer started up, fanfare and everything. "What can I do for you today Sarah Jane?"

Sarah Jane took off her watch and placed it on the computer's tray. "I need you to analyze the readings I took earlier from a boy who isn't quite right. There's something different about him, but I just can't figure out what. I also need you to find out everything you can about a Heiji Ikenami, about sixteen to eighteen years old."

Mr. Smith worked dutifully. In a few seconds he responded, a picture coming up on the screen. "Heiji Ikenami, seventeen years old. Currently a resident of Osaka, in the Kansai region of Japan. Attends Kaihou School and lives with his aunt and uncle, Heizo and Shizuka Hattori. Was born in the United States of America, where he lived with his parents until they recently passed away."

"Is that it?" Sarah Jane asked. "What about the names of his parents, where he lived when he was in America?"

"Sarah Jane, if I were to venture my professional opinion, based on the data, I conclude that before Heiji Ikenami went to live with his aunt and uncle, he did not exist."

Sarah Jane made a motion with her fist. "I knew it. What about his aunt and uncle, what can you tell me about them?"

The picture of Heiji was replaced by two other pictures. "Heizo Hattori is a high-ranking official in the Osaka Police Department. His life is well documented, and I cannot find any irregularities. Shizuka Hattori is unemployed. There is one potential irregularity, but it is easily explained by a mundane reason."

"Do they have any children?" Sarah Jane questioned.

A picture of a dark-skinned teenager showed up on the screen. "One child, Heiji Hattori, aged seventeen. Currently missing presumed dead. He disappeared during the Cybermen invasion of Tokyo and has not been seen since."

Sarah Jane nodded. "Poor boy. Horrible way to go." She then frowned. "Name's the same... Mr. Smith, what was that potential irregularity you mentioned concerning Shizuka Hattori?"

"Shizuka Hattori, née Ikenami. Her life is not as well documented as her husband's, so I cannot be certain of anything. But please observe, a photo of Shizuka Ikenami at her wedding, and a photo of another Shizuka Ikenami at the age of seven." Two photos showed up on the screen. There was a large age gap, but there could be no doubt. They were two different people. "Both of these people are identified as Shizuka Ikenami. Even more, they were born in the same year. In fact if it weren't for one thing they could easily be the same person."

"The photographs. They're completely different," Sarah Jane agreed. She then had an idea. "Mr. Smith, show me photos of Heiji Hattori and Heiji Ikenami!" The photos showed up on the screen. Sarah Jane moved in for a closer look. "Again, they're completely different," she muttered to herself.

"I disagree Sarah Jane," Mr. Smith insisted. "While the similarities are vague, they are not completely different as you say. And aside from the very vague similarities in their facial bone structure, I suggest that you focus your attention on the eyes."

Sarah Jane did. It took her breath away. "A shape-shifter," she said quietly.

"It would seem so. Sarah Jane, I have finished analyzing the readings."

"And?"

"You were quite right. Heiji Ikenami is not human."

"Well if he's not human then what is he?"

"I do not know."

"What do you mean you don't know?" Sarah Jane demanded. "Surely you know of every species anywhere near Earth."

"I do, which leads me to conclude one of two things. He is either from very far away, which is unlikely, or he is a remnant."

"A remnant? A remnant of what?" Sarah Jane wanted to know.

"A very old, dead race. A race so old and so dead that not even ruins remain of their cities."

"Why Mr. Smith, that was almost poetic," Sarah Jane smiled. "But how can something remain if a civilization died that long ago?"

"Insufficient data," Mr. Smith responded, but Sarah Jane was too lost in her thoughts to hear.

"That's not possible. Unless... but that in itself is surely just as impossible."

"What are you suggesting, Sarah Jane?"

Sarah Jane cocked her head at the computer. "I'm suggesting that I'm going to go out. And while I'm gone, you are to monitor extra-terrestrial life closer then ever. Actually, monitor any temporal shifts as well. And let me know if anything at all happens!" she said as she grabbed her purse and bounded out of the room.

* * *

"I don't know what your mum's so worried about," Clyde whispered to Luke. "He seems like a normal bloke."

Luke shrugged. "I'm sure she has a reason," he whispered back. "Maybe she was picking up strange readings."

Upon arriving at the library, Luke had magically remembered that they needed to pick up some books for a research project. Maria had cottoned on at once, though they had had to drag Clyde into the stacks and explain things to him before he gave them away. The older boy had nearly escaped while they were looking at books, but they caught up to him by the exit and insisted that they get lunch together at the café across the street.

Heiji had just excused himself to go to the bathroom when Luke's phone rang. "Mum!" he answered.

"_Where are you, is he still with you?_"

Luke didn't need to ask who she was talking about. "We're still with him, but we're not at the library anymore. We're in the café across the the street."

"_I'll be there any minute. Don't let him out of your sight!_"

Luke hung up. Then something occurred to him. "Clyde?"

"What?"

"There's a window he could escape through, isn't there?"

Clyde banged on the table. "Shoot!"

Luke jumped up. "Clyde, you and Maria stay here in case he comes back. I'll go find the window."

Clyde and Maria nodded, and Luke dashed out of the café. He ran into the alleyway the hall window would exit into, but saw no one. He carefully maneuvered around the trash cans.

There was suddenly a noise from behind. "Stop, and turn around slowly."

Luke slowly turned. Heiji stood there. "What are you doing here?" Luke demanded to know.

"I could ask you the same thing. Your mother ordered you to keep a watch on me. Why?"

"No she didn't," Luke insisted.

"I must admit, you and your friends are quite good. But not good enough. Is your mother really a journalist?"

"Yeah she is. And she thinks there's something odd about you."

"You're a bit odd yourself. Tell me, where are you from?" Heiji advanced.

"Stop right there!" Sarah Jane shouted as she dashed into the alley.

Heiji slowly turned slightly, keeping one eye on Luke. "And she returns from the urgent work she had to do. Call your friends did you? Are they on their way? Am I going to have to start running?"

Sarah Jane pulled the sonic lipstick out of her purse and pointed it at Heiji. "Only if you mean us harm."

Heiji snorted. "Never heard that one before. Nice sonic device, I have a friend who has something like that. Except his was blue and silver and," he raised an eyebrow, "Less girly," he finished with slight distaste.

"You're a long way from home," Sarah Jane ignored the slight, though the look on her face was quite knowing.

"Wait, you know who he is?" Clyde asked, he and Maria having followed her.

Heiji tilted his head. "Japan, Great Britain. Yeah, I suppose you could say that."

"Oh that's not what I meant. Not at all, and you know it."

"Oh I was born here just like every single one of you. I hope," he added with a glance at Luke.

"Oh really?" Sarah Jane demanded. "Time Lord of Gallifrey."

"You are good," Heiji applauded. "Last time I checked, most species don't even believe that they exist."

"Which was why at first I couldn't identify you as anything other than some sort of shape changer. But you're supposed to be impossible! The Time Lords are all dead!"

"If you want to get really technical about it, all but 1.75 of them."

"What are you guys talking about?" Clyde demanded to know.

"I'm sure Luke here could do the math," Heiji replied.

"Luke, what's going on?" Maria asked.

Luke's mouth opened slightly in surprise. "I get it! But that would mean..."

"No, he is not my grandfather," Heiji cut Luke off. "I just traveled with him for a while, that's all. After he helped me out of a bad spot."

"I did too!" Sarah Jane replied, the sonic lipstick lowering.

Heiji shrugged. "I guessed as much. Among other things, it would explain why you're going completely nuts over my very existence."

Clyde started waving his hands in the air. "Is someone going to tell us what on earth is going on here?"

Sarah Jane slipped the sonic lipstick back into her bag. "You know the Doctor I've mentioned? Heiji is a member of the same race."

"Sort of. Not really. Only a quarter actually," Heiji continued.

"It's more than he ever expected to find," Sarah Jane replied.

"Tell me about it. I think he would've been freaking out about it even more than you if it weren't for the fact that I was dying at the time."

Sarah Jane nodded. "The Cybermen, was it?"

Heiji grimaced. "Yeah. They caused a right mess."

"Wait," Maria said. "So what are you?"

Heiji shrugged. "I'm human, mostly. My grandfather was a Time Lord, but that's it. Saved my life, though sometimes I wish there had been a better way."

"That sort of thing is rather problematic. We were going to go to the park before you distracted us. Would you like to join us?" Sarah Jane offered.

Heiji checked his watch, then shook his head. "Sorry, but I told my parents I'd meet them."

"The Hattoris?" Sarah Jane asked.

"You are clever. I can see why he likes you," Heiji replied. "Some other time perhaps. If I'm ever in London again I'll look you up."

Sarah Jane nodded. "We'll be here. Good luck!"

"You too," Heiji waved as he strode off.

Throughout all of time and space there are monsters. Monsters that will chase you and eat you. But sometimes there are friends to give you a helping hand where you expected to find monsters. Those friends are usually the best.

* * *

**Yeah, have some more Heiji. And now I'm really tempted to write Maria in America helping aliens hide and running into the Kudos. Hooray for the Children and Grandchildren of Time!**


	21. Time and Space and a Truce

**Time and Space and a Truce**

**Timeframe: The Sontaran Strategem/The Poison Sky**

**Summary: An inspector and a thief are trapped in a closet together while the world chokes. They argue, naturally.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, Detective Conan, or Magic Kaito.**

**Notes: Happy Memorial Day Weekend! (Forgot that last time)**

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As Inspector Nakamori slowly came to, he heard the sound of someone coughing nearby. There was something foreign on his face. He slowly reached a hand up and felt it, deciding it must be a gas mask. This left the identity of the coughing person with him, and where exactly they were. It was a small, enclosed space, illuminated only by a small flashlight pointing at nothing in particular. The silhouette however was more than enough identification. "Kid?" Nakamori asked, choking slightly on the words in his dry mouth.

"You're awak-" Kid was cut off by a fit of coughs. After a few minutes he managed to get it under control. "I found you lying unconscious in the hallway. Couldn't just leave you there. This is a nearby closet, I've sealed us in as best I could. Not very well, but it's better than nothing." He started coughing again.

Inspector Nakamori remembered. It was two minutes before the heist was scheduled to start when all of the cars in the area went haywire, spewing out smoke like nobody's business. His men had gone nuts, running around like headless chickens, while the smoke had just continued to get worse and worse. He had found himself alone and coughing in a hallway of the museum, and that must be when he passed out. "Does anybody know what's going on yet?"

Kid shook his head. "None of the policemen anyway," he replied, waving a police radio. Inspector Nakamori was going to refrain from asking where he got it. Kid opened his mouth to say something more, but he was interrupted by another coughing fit.

Inspector Nakamori pushed himself up to lean against the closet wall and pulled off the gas mask. It was undoubtedly Kid's. He held it out. "Take it."

Kid stared at him. "No. You need it more than I."

Inspector Nakamori took a small, experimental breath. The air reeked, and he had to hold back a cough. If he showed weakness, Kid would never take the mask. "I'll be fine," he assured, "Which is better than you sound. If we trade off we should be okay."

Kid stared for a few seconds, then he hesitantly accepted the mask. He turned away from Nakamori and took off his top hat to put it on. Nakamori realized that the smoke must be affecting him more than he thought it was, because the silhouette looked almost familiar. Then the top hat went back on and Kid turned back around. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths.

Nakamori meanwhile grabbed his radio. "This is Nakamori. Someone, report!"

Kid shook his head. "I've already tried. Nobody's answering."

Nakamori glared. "And why would they answer to you?"

"Because they would have though I was _you_."

Nakamori's glare deepened, though he could see the thief's point. He set himself to thinking out loud. "So all the cars suddenly go nuts and start spewing smoke. Not just some of them, all of them. Why?"

Kid joined him. "Not all of them. I saw one that wasn't. So most of the other cars have something in common that that one car doesn't."

"But what would most of the cars in Tokyo have in common that a handful of cars don't?"

Kid's one slightly visible eye went wide. "ATMOS," he breathed.

"What? Why can't the cars have something else in common, like a particular engine component?" Nakamori demanded.

"Because these are cars of all kinds of makes and ages, it's incredibly unlikely that they would have anything else in common," Kid explained. "But isn't ATMOS in something like half the cars in the world now? That's got to be it!"

Nakamori coughed before replying. "ATMOS is supposed to negate the pollution a car makes, not increase it seemingly exponentially."

Kid glanced at Nakamori worriedly. "But what if... what if it's not getting rid of the pollution," he theorized, "But just hanging on to it. Storing it until... no, that can't be right. There'd be far less if that were the case." He suddenly held a hand out to Nakamori. "I need your phone."

"Why? What for?"

"I may just be jumping at shadows, but this might have something to do with him. I just need to check. I need your phone."

"Why don't you just use yours? And who's him?"

Kid gave him a scathing look, and Nakamori handed his phone over. Of course an internationally wanted thief would carry a phone on the job. Kid started dialing as he explained. "It's hard to explain. He's sort of an acquaintance of mine. But I'm not calling him, because as far as I know he hasn't got a number. I'm calling Hakuba-kun. He's with him."

Nakamori opened his mouth to demand to know why Hakuba-kun would be with this person that Kid was talking about, but started coughing horribly instead. Kid pulled off the gas mask and handed it over. Nakamori realized that he didn't have much choice in the matter and accepted it. Kid's visible eye lit up as the call apparently connected. "Tantei-san! How good to hear your voice!"

"_Do I want to know why Kaito Kid is calling me from the Inspector's cell?_"

"We're sort of holed up in a closet together. You wouldn't happen to know anything about large quantities of toxic air would you?"

"_We're working... Conan!_"

Kid frowned. "Conan? Is Tantei-kun there?"

"_No, different Conan,_" Saguru answered a little too quickly. He then started talking to someone who was with him. "_Donna, get him to the TARDIS. I'll follow in a second._" His voice became slightly louder as it turned back towards the phone. "_As I was saying, we're working on it._"

"How successful working on it?

"_Working on it working on it._"

"Well work on it faster, because the Inspector and I only have one gas mask between us and sharing is sub-optimal."

"_The Doctor's doing his best._"

Inspector Nakamori suddenly grabbed the phone out of Kid's hand and threw back the gas mask. "Hakuba-kun, where the hell are you and what the hell is going on?" he demanded loudly.

"_Nice to hear from you too Inspector. As to where I am, I'm in London. As to what's going on, I'm almost certain that it's classified information._"

"What, and you're privy to it?"

"_No, but I know someone who is._" Saguru suddenly started coughing. "_Now I really must go, but the situation will return to normal as soon as possible._"

"Thank you Hakuba-kun. Good luck."

"_You too._" And the line cut.

"Oi!" Kid shouted. "I wasn't done yet you know!"

"Bug him later after he saves the world!" Nakamori shouted back.

Kid looked on appreciatively. "You certainly catch on fast."

That irritated the Inspector. "It's not for nothing that I chase you, and don't you forget it!"

"Inspector," Kid replied, feeling in his words, "Why ever would I do that?"

And when all was said and done, Nakamori turned a blind eye to the thief escaping right behind him. It was only fair.

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**Reviews, as always, are highly valued and appreciated.**


	22. Drabblicious 1

**Drabblicious 1: And Then There Were Aliens**

**Timeframe: All over the place.**

**Summary: Donna implies something, Conan is annoyed, Kaito is annoying, and Saguru would like his book back. Oh, and the end of the world.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, Detective Conan, or Magic Kaito**

**Notes: All of these, except the last one, correspond to a particular episode and may or may not be expanded upon if the muse hits me. The last one's just cute and takes place in the slightly distant future. And then there's the one with Eleven and Amy, but shhh.**

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There was a murder, a mystery, and Agatha Christie.

Even Conan was having problems describing this as anything other than badass. Saguru was too busy drooling. Both were a little disappointed when it turned out to be a little more than your regular murder mystery. But ah well, all's well that ends well.

It was when they were about to leave that the Doctor realized what he had unleashed.

"Can we go see Sir Arthur Conan Doyle now?" came simultaneously. "Please?"

"If you were not expecting that, I don't know what is wrong with your brain Spaceman," Donna deadpanned.

* * *

Donna grabbed the shirt off the railing. "I knew it! Acting all innocent… I'm not the first, am I? How many women have you two abducted?"

The Doctor's eyes roved downwards towards the shirt. "That's my friend's."

Donna pointed at Saguru. "What, him?"

Oh no no no no no. Saguru was _not_ wearing something like that, _ever_. Rose had good taste and all, but he was still a guy. And being dressed up by Kaito Kid in his book quite firmly did not count. "Someone else," he said, gesturing for her to _shut up_.

"Well I thought so, but I couldn't be certain. I mean, you are a teenage boy traveling around space with an alien all on your lonesome."

All thoughts of getting Donna to shut up about Rose fled Saguru's mind as he realized what she was implying. He turned bright red and started sputtering.

* * *

Colonel Mayes was not amused. "Sir, just because you're technically still on staff does not give you carte blanche to do whatever you like. I will not have a child wandering around this facility."

"One," Conan butted in, "This child can hear you, and two, I'm actually seventeen."

"What, you used to work for them?" Donna asked.

"Yeah, back in the seventies. Or was it the eighties? Anyway, it was all a bit more... homespun back then."

"Doctor, you've seen it all, you've been on board the Valiant," Martha replied. "We've got massive military funding now all in the name of homeworld security."

"A modern UNIT for the modern world," Colonel Mayes continued.

Donna started arguing with him as the Doctor crouched down. "More to the point Conan, are you okay with him knowing that? He probably gets around," he whispered.

Conan shrugged. "It shut him up."

* * *

Kaito's cellphone rang during lunch. He was more than surprised to see that the caller was one Hakuba Saguru, MIA. He answered it. "You do realize that everyone's completely off their rocker over you, right?" he started with a question.

"_Not now Kuroba, I need to know the name of a magician, some guy who had these three laws about magic._"

"The Inspector's gone round the bend, and that's put Aoko in a right foul mood. I'm paying for your indiscretion you know."

"_Kuroba, I need to know this. Lives are at stake._"

Kaito smirked. "That's all I needed to hear. Howard Thurston, I think."

"_What do you mean, you think?_"

"Well, there may be a less famous one who also had three laws, and depending on where you are, they may be referring to a local..." Kaito dribbled off, keeping his wording vague on purpose. Fuel for the fire, no matter how unusable, was still fuel. "But it's most likely Howard Thurston."

There was some indecipherable muttering on the other end, then Saguru was back. "_Kuroba, you're a lifesaver._"

Kaito smirked, trying to sound as insufferable as he knew how. "I know. Should I tell anyone you called, or would you like to remain vanished for a little bit longer? You're being compared to Kudo Shinichi you know."

"_Don't bother. I'll be back soon._"

"You'd better be, because I won't be staying up for you."

"_No, you'll be staying up for something else entirely._"

"Uh-huh, whatever floats your boat. I'll keep an eye up for you."

"_I really hate you sometimes._"

"I know," Kaito replied, pouring every ounce of sugar and sweet he had into it.

* * *

The Doctor and Amy both stared at the TARDIS phone. At first the Doctor had wondered where it came from, but then he put that together with the fact that he couldn't find Martha's phone anywhere, and it made sense. But that was neither here nor there. "Amy, pick it up."

Amy rolled her eyes, but picked up the phone anyway. "Hello, you have reached the TARDIS."

"_Ah, good for him. What's your name?_"

Amy frowned, just a mite confused. "Amy Pond. Why?"

"_You keep the Doctor in line, will you? He has a distressing tendency to cross it. Do me a favor and ask him what he knows about a first edition of _A Study in Scarlet_ by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Ask him if he has one._"

Amy did so. The Doctor responded with gusto. "Never had you pegged for a fan. I seem to attract them like flies. Yeah, I've got one. I had to pack for a former companion and couldn't help myself. He won't miss it."

Amy relayed this back as the Doctor's face slowly fell as he realized just what he had just said. "_Put him on. Now._"

Amy held out the phone, a smirk on her face. The Doctor gingerly took it. "Ah, hello Saguru. Er, what a pleasant surprise."

"_Nice try. Now put the Doctor on._"

"No, I assure you, this is really me. I regenerated."

"_You get into so much trouble without me. Of course, you got into rather a lot of trouble with me so that's not saying much. The book? I would like it delivered post-haste._"

"There's a tiny problem with that. I'm right in the middle of it."

"_Liar. Get your own._"

The Doctor sighed. "Fine. You're so mean."

"_I'm not feeling particularly charitable towards you at the moment, no. I wonder why?_"

"We'll be there in a tick."

The Doctor handed the phone to Amy who hung up for him. She then folded her arms. "Resorting to stealing someone's book, shame on you."

"It's a first edition!" the Doctor insisted.

Amy snorted. "Yeah? This is a _time machine_. Just go back and buy another one."

"But that one was signed by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself!"

"Then get him to sign the new one."

"I can't."

"Why?"

The Doctor grimaced. "Shortly after that one was signed, there was an... incident. He, ah, wasn't too chuffed about it. He wasn't too chuffed about the entire thing really, once Saguru and Conan got their hands on him. Attack of the fanboys indeed. And then there were aliens, and things just went downhill from there."

Amy raised her eyebrows, looking curious in a devious sort of way. "Well let's return that book then shall we? I want to hear this story from someone reliable."

* * *

Harriet Jones fiddled with her controls a bit more. "Hang on, one more person's trying to get through... and there!"

The screen frizzled, then cleared to reveal one Heiji Hattori. "Sarah Jane Smith, how good to see you again!" he greeted, grinning widely. A young woman suddenly showed on the screen, and started saying something in a foreign language. Heiji answered back. The volume escalated.

"We're a bit busy at the moment, so if you don't mind?" Harriet interrupted.

Heiji said one last thing angrily at the girl, then turned back. "Sorry about that. What is this anyway? The laptop suddenly switched itself on?"

"First, introductions. I thought it was time, given the situation, that we all met. Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister."

"Yes, we know who you are," Heiji answered. "Heiji Hattori, sometimes Ikenami, former companion to the Doctor."

"Not half bad," Captain Jack Harkness commented. Ianto glared.

"Not now Captain," Harriet admonished. "And Martha Jones, also a former companion."

"We need the Doctor," Martha spoke up. "I've been trying to call him, but I can't get through."

"I've been trying to contact him as well," Heiji replied. "Sometimes I think I'm reaching him, but then all of a sudden there's not so much as a whiff."

"A whiff?" Jack repeated, finding the exact word usage odd.

Heiji tapped his head. "Telepathy."

Jack grinned, folding his arms. "Tell me Heiji Hattori, sometimes Ikenami: are you older than you look?"

"Not yet," Heiji grinned back.

"Hey, hang on," Martha caught up. "You're-"

"Something that was never in the Time Lock in the first place didn't have to escape it," Heiji explained slyly.

"He must have flipped," Jack quipped.

Martha rolled her eyes. "Yeah, considering what happened last time."

Heiji opened his mouth to say something, but suddenly stopped when the young woman from before came back and started shouting at him. He gulped. "They're coming. I've got to go. I'll try to get to another computer, but for the moment I've got to go."

Jack saluted. "Good luck."

Heiji nodded. "Good luck to all of you." The screen fizzled, then Heiji was gone.

* * *

The screen frazzled slightly. "Hey, what's going on?" the Doctor wondered aloud, fiddling with the controls.

"It must be Heiji, he must be reconnecting!" Sarah Jane cheered.

The screen cleared, but there was no one there. A young boy suddenly popped up. "Hi! Heiji is busy blowing up Daleks and can't come to the computer right now. Would you like me to give him a message?" he asked in heavily-accented English.

The Doctor's hand suddenly pushed down on something, and there was a slight squawk to be heard. Sarah Jane was confused. Jack and Martha understood.

* * *

The two of them sat curled up on the couch, content with each other's company. Well, mostly. "Heiji, how would you feel if I told you I wanted to have kids?"

Her companion did a bit of a double-take at that. "Kids?" he repeated, like the word was slightly foreign.

Kazuha nodded. "Yes, kids. What do you think?"

Heiji grimaced slightly. Kazuha took that as a bad sign. "Well... they wouldn't be normal kids. They'd be alien kids."

"Yeah, I know that."

"And that would be a whole lot harder than normal kids."

Kazuha shifted to look straight at her husband. "Yeah, I know that Heiji. I just want to know what you think."

Heiji ran a hand through his hair. "Just making sure that you realize just what that would entail. It would be something else abnormal to deal with, along with everything else."

Kazuha closed her eyes. She knew that. She knew that having a husband who looked increasingly younger than her was already getting her the occasional strange look. She knew that one day she would get old and frail, and then be gone, and then he would call up that man in the blue box and leave Earth, possibly never to return. And that was why. "Heiji, I want kids. I want kids so that when I'm gone you have a reason to return here every once and a while. Please Heiji."

Heiji leaned over and kissed her, gently. "You sure?"

Kazuha glared. "Alien baby. Now."

Heiji chuckled, teasing, "You make it sound like any old alien will do."

"Shut up and kiss me again, damn it."

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**How is Heiji blowing up Daleks, you ask? He has a bokken. It was a gift from the Doctor. It's not nearly as good as the baseball bat, but it gets the job done. Reviews are always highly appreciated.**


	23. Time and Space and a Spare Room

**Time and Space and a Spare Room**

**Timeframe: Generic Series 5**

**Summary****: Her fingers refused to touch the surface for fear of something horrible happening, while at the same time she thought that maybe something horrible already had.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito.**

**Notes: Whups, just accidentally typed 'Noes'. Which you will be crying.**

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There's a spare room in the Kuroba household. The walls are stacked high with shelves and the shelves are stacked high with boxes full of various knickknacks and memorabilia that Chikage can't or won't get rid of. Lost objects, trapped in limbo with no proper place in the world.

They had had plans for that spare room, oh yes. Plans that kept getting pushed back, reasons upon good reasons for doing so, until one day they were canceled permanently by an explosive finale with no survivors. And then she is conflicted because there would be more people hurting if they had gone through with their plans, but at least then she wouldn't be alone.

She remembered Jii, oh yes she remembered him. She had thought for a moment, one blissful moment, that it wasn't true, that somewhere there was a gravestone that shouldn't exist. That some shirts in a box could become shirts in a drawer once again, and should have always been shirts in a drawer. But she had been sorely disappointed, at the same time reminding herself that what she asked for was impossible.

Oh yes she remembered Jii. She remembered their entire conversation that night, down to the last syllable, and she remembered clearly how, after making her escape, she had collapsed in an alley and, after changing, cried until it seemed like she couldn't anymore. Then she staggered home, collapsed on a bed that was too big, and cried some more.

The next time she had left the house, it was to visit his grave. She'd had a one-sided conversation with the slab of granite, and come up with something that roughly amounted to a plan. She knew it was a stupid plan, but it was a plan nonetheless. It wasn't like she had much of a life to give now anyway. She may have done something different if the spare room wasn't a spare room, but as it was the spare room was and only ever had been a spare room.

She passed the door to the spare room regularly on the way to what she called work. Sometimes, when she had a spare moment to go with the spare room, she would poke her head in and rummage through this box or that. Awards and certificates, dusty tomes, decks of cards worn with use, and once Toichi's baby book. She'd giggled slightly as she flipped through the pages, as the blank face of a newborn slowly morphed into that of a toddler, with notes on all the trouble he was getting into in a faded, loopy script. She'd then looked up and made long eye contact with the room and, suddenly sober, closed the book quickly and shoved it back in with the other forgotten relics of a bygone era.

She found work fun, sort of. Sometimes it was hard to keep a game face when all you wanted to do was spill everything and, like most people, just let the police handle it. Sometimes it felt like she was getting nowhere, others it felt like it was all going too fast and she was going to trip and fall any second.

She stared to collect detectives again, just like she had back in the good old days. There was the Inspector of course, a gruff man managing to worm his way into her heart. And a blond boy, slightly foreign though she had yet to learn the full story, someone who carried a pocket watch and was oh so good at the chase. And somehow, inexplicably, a little boy with glasses, who seemed to have more secrets than even her, and definitely had a severe case of more than meets the eye. He chased and chased and chased, and she ran and ran and ran. And they'd meet up and exchange witty banter, and he'd imply that Kaito Kid wasn't actually a guy, and she'd imply that he wasn't actually a kid. And she loved it, and somehow this kid, this adorable little kid who was too clever for his own good, managed to make it all worth it whenever he showed up, and she thought that maybe something was missing. Something important that she was forgetting. But then she realized that that was silly, and forgot about forgetting.

Sometimes things didn't make sense. Sometimes she felt that something should happen but it didn't, and sometimes she felt that something shouldn't happen but it did. Whilst escaping one night she felt that there should be guns, but there weren't. It was almost like she wanted there to be guns, like the guns were an integral part, but she knew that logically she shouldn't want there to be guns. And then there was a time when she caught sight of a messy-haired girl, daughter to the Inspector, and she knew her name. The name rose unbidden to her lips, and she thought for a moment that the girl, whatever her name was, should've been called that because it seemed perfect for her. And then she was called that name, and Chikage was curious for a moment before dismissing it. She must've heard it somewhere else before. She must have.

And throughout her life, the door to the spare room had been staring at her. Accusing her of something, though she couldn't name what. She felt obligated to look through the boxes, as if they held the answers, but at the same time she felt like she was intruding on something private. Which couldn't be, as this was her house. There was no one else here to intrude upon. Even though the notebook half-full of math equations didn't just get up and walk behind that stack of boxes from wherever it came from, even though she couldn't recognize the writing but she felt she should, there was nothing to intrude upon.

What Chikage was missing, what she was always missing, was a corner of the spare room that she always, inexplicably, stayed well away from. She couldn't tell you why, but she did all the same. If she had looked in the boxes there, just once, she might have noticed a crack. A crack in the wall that, despite the smile-like shape, would have given the shivers. She would write it off to that American movie she'd seen, the superhero one where the villain had a too-large smile, even though the smile in the crack didn't make her think of an insane man but rather a crazy boy, all grins and mischief, a boy she'd never seen before in her life.

But if this ever happened, even though it wouldn't because Chikage never went anywhere near the boxes the crack was behind, she wouldn't touch it. Her fingers would not dare to brush it's surface, because she knew instinctively that if they did something horrible would happen, while at the same time thinking that maybe something horrible already has happened.

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**The Joker's smile is a crack! Pleasant dreams!**


	24. Time and Space and Spoilers

**Time and Space and Spoilers**

**Timeframe: Series 5**

**Summary: Aoko discovers something she isn't supposed to. Amy doesn't help. "And then he and you... ooh, spoilers."**

**Disclaimer: If I owned Doctor Who and Magic Kaito, this would be canon.**

**Notes: I was trying to figure out who to stick in the TARDIS next, because it's not much of a crossover if no one's in the TARDIS. I was contemplating the real Conan. Then the Doctor had a mop and a fez, and all was clear to me.**

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"_WHAT?_"

The sound reverberated throughout the TARDIS, as though it had been shouted, nay, screamed at the top of the lungs of a _very_ peeved young woman. Which indeed it had. Amy Pond was curious, though not really surprised. There were no lusty warlords or shifty megamillionaires out to make a quick buck in the TARDIS, so the only question was what had caused the scream this time.

She found Aoko in the library, staring in aghast horror at a terminal set into the side of a shelf. Ripples moved away from her along the swimming pool, evidence of the bellow. "Find something unpleasant?" she asked, walking towards the angry Asian.

Aoko's head whipped around, rage contorting her features. "My best friend is an internationally wanted criminal!"

Amy sidled up next to her, hoping for a picture. "Seriously? Is he hot?"

Aoko roared again, nearly bursting Amy's eardrums. "That bastard! That two-timing, conniving little-"

"So his persona as an internationally wanted criminal has a girlfriend?"

"_We're not dating! We're definitely not dating now!_" Aoko took a deep breath. "He knows that I would hate him if I knew. He's been sneaking around my back all this time!" She started growling, audibly if not intelligibly.

Amy looked at the screen to see a picture of someone dressed all in white, and a mugshot of a cute Asian man in his twenties. "Really? It says here you're suspected of being an accomplice, though nothing is ever proven."

Aoko's face became ashen, then quickly hardened again. She started marching off in the direction of the console room. "I'm going to kill him! Right now!"

Amy poked around on the console a bit. "Are you sure about that? It says he's trying to save the world."

Aoko turned around, deadpan. "Huh?"

"Okay, I lied. But it's not all bad news. He only gets a couple years for extenuating circumstances-"

"Extenuating circumstances?"

"-and then he and you... ooh, spoilers."

Aoko looked murderous. "_Show me!_"

"Spoilers!"

"_Show me damn it!_" Aoko shouted, moving forward to wrestle control from Amy.

Amy quickly pressed a few buttons, and the screen changed. "Oops! It seems I've locked it, and only the Doctor can bring it up now!"

Aoko shoved Amy aside, only to see that she was telling the truth. Roaring once more, she stormed out of the library, shouting something about finding the Doctor.

Then the Doctor poked his head in. "Do I want to know why she's looking for me?"

"She found a file on a friend of hers," Amy replied, mock apologetically. "She didn't like what she saw."

The Doctor winced. "Err, how far did she get?"

"Just the job. Then she stormed off, and I locked it."

The Doctor sighed in slight relief. Then something occurred to him. "You didn't taunt her at all, did you?"

"...Maybe, a little."

The Doctor sighed again, this time not in relief. "I guess I'd better go stop her from destroying something." He wandered off, clearly not liking this plan.

Amy, meanwhile, slipped a printout from a hidden printer in the bookshelf into her pocket. This would make for some good reading.

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**Now they just need to go out and buy matching fezes. Reviews please!**


	25. Time and Space and Confrontations

**Time and Space and Confrontations/Ekoda Intermission the Third**

**Timeframe: Distant future. Aoko is definitely still in the TARDIS after Series 5. As far as this fic is concerned, she is the Current Companion. One of these days I'll get around to writing when that came about.**

**Summary: Aoko has two things to talk to Kaito about. One doesn't involve any words, and the other involves very loud words of a specific nature.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Magic Kaito or Doctor Who.**

**Notes: I almost find it amusing that Kaito is the most insane character other than maybe the Doctor, and yet I barely play with him in this fic. Really, I'm wasting him.**

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**

She couldn't believe it. She had made it. Actually made it back home right after she'd left. Considering the kind of timing she'd experienced, she considered this nothing short of a miracle.

Considering the kind of timing she'd experienced, she was going to have a chat with Hakuba-kun in the upcoming future. But that wasn't the most important thing at the moment. The most important thing at the moment was one Kuroba Kaito. She was going to bash his brains out. If he had known what purpose she was coming for, he would not have just opened his front door for her. "Aoko! What's up?"

Aoko swallowed. "Two things, and one of them is actually down."

Kaito grinned. "That's bad. That's really bad. I'd better fix it for you then." There was a small poof, and a red rose appeared in her hair. "Does that help?"

"Can I come in?" Aoko asked, not answering his question.

"Why are you bothering to ask?" Kaito responded, moving to let her in. Aoko walked in, and Kaito closed the door behind her. "Now, what seems to be the problem?" he asked, folding his arms.

"Firstly," Aoko started, and then, steeling herself, stepped forward and quickly kissed Kaito. He reacted in surprise at first, then unfolded his arms and embraced her, returning the kiss.

She broke it off quickly however, again surprising Kaito. "I hope that's not the thing that's actually down," he joked. He opened his mouth to say more, but shut it again when he saw that Aoko was about to say something.

"And secondly, _WHEN THE FUCK WERE YOU PLANNING ON TELLING ME YOU'RE KAITO KID, ASSHOLE?_" An unlucky boot that happened to be in the entryway flew at his head.

Kaito stepped back quickly. "Aoko, what are you on about?"

"_YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT I'M ON ABOUT, BASTARD!_" A broom swipe on Aoko's part led to a quick duck on Kaito's.

"Aoko, remember that time that Hakuba suspected me, and there was a heist while I was standing there? And before that I was at Tropical Land with you during a heist," Kaito protested, putting his acrobatic skills to the test whilst dodging broom.

"EASILY EXPLAINED!"

Kaito balanced on the stair railing and folded his arms. "Tell me how, oh knowledgeable one."

"_Time travel!_" Aoko growled.

Kaito nearly fell off the railing. Aoko took the chance to fling the other boot at him. It flew wide, knocking over some sort of mechanism that Aoko didn't _want_ to ask about. Kaito leapt down in front of her, grabbing both her arms and holding them in a tight grip, blocking her movement. "Aoko," he said, dead serious, "There's no such thing as time travel."

"Yeah there is damn it, and you've been time traveling!" she shouted, struggling against him. "You've got a Vortex Manipulator, haven't you? Or something like it!"

"Aoko, I'm not Kaito Kid. How can I be in two places at once, twice? Calm down and think rationally." Really, Kaito should've guessed that something was up when she kissed him. He just didn't think she was quite _that_ bi-polar.

"TIME TRAVEL! YES YOU ARE, _don't deny it!_ And if you don't stop you're going to get arrested, please Kaito I know you are!" She wrested one arm out of Kaito's grip and pulled out her cellphone. "I'll call Hakuba-kun, he'll agree with me! I know you're Kid, the databank said so, therefore you've been in two places at once, and the only way to do that is with a clone, alternate universe double, or time travel. Time travel would be the most dangerous but also the most likely, all things considering! Hell I've been time traveling, Hakuba-kun's been time traveling, why can't you have been time traveling?"

Her cellphone disappeared from her hand and reappeared in Kaito's, while his other hand loosened slightly in it's grip on her wrist. "You never disappeared like Hakuba did," he said quietly.

"Time travel," Aoko replied. "I've been having adventures for a while. So you admit it then."

Aoko's phone vanished from Kaito's hand, and she felt a familiar weight settle into her pocket. Kaito let go of her wrist and his hands were shoved into his pockets protectively. "I admit to being Kid. There was no time travel involved though."

"Then how did you do it?"

"The first time I had forty minutes. You dragged me into that movie, remember? The second time I got lucky, and someone filled in for me. Interesting theory about me being gay, by the way."

Aoko blushed. "Yeah, sorry about that."

There was a brief awkward silence. "So now what?"

Aoko hmphed. "I should think that that's obvious. We get to work."

"'We'?" Kaito questioned, sinking slightly.

"The databank said that I was implicated but nothing was ever proven. And there's a heist coming up. So let's get to work."

She started to walk past Kaito, but he stopped her. "There's no such thing as destiny you know. You can do whatever you want."

"I've been time traveling, I've had a _long_ time to think about this. Be glad for it, at first I wanted to drag you to Dad bound and gagged, and missing some of your anatomy. I don't want to turn you in, and I don't want you to get arrested. I'd rather you weren't doing this in the first place, but I'm guessing there's not much I can say to dissuade you. There's no such thing as destiny, so I'm going to do my damnedest to stop you getting arrested from happening."

Kaito thought for a long moment. "When do I get arrested?"

Aoko glared at nothing in particular. "Amy wouldn't tell me. But we've got a couple years at least."

"Best make the most of them then." Kaito grinned, offering Aoko his arm. "Shall I escort you to the Kid Cave?"

Aoko slipped her arm into his. "I thought you'd never ask."

A revolving painting and a ladder later, Aoko found herself in a brightly lit workroom reminiscent of MI6, Q Division. She looked around in awe. "Kaito, this place is amazing! How come no one's found it before?"

Kaito jabbed his finger at a mechanism near the bottom of the ladder. "The painting was on an eight-year timer. It wouldn't release until eight years had passed."

Aoko bent down to inspect the timer. "But I've seen something like this before."

Kaito joined her, frowning. "Really?"

Aoko poked at it with her finger. "Not the whole thing, just this bit here. It looks like part of a perception filter. We ran into this group of people with a cheap, off-brand one that was quite old as well, and they needed the Doctor to fix it to do some undercover work. This bit here looks like the main chip and engine."

Kaito's frown deepened. "But if that's a chip and engine as you say, then this would probably be the battery and the wires connecting them. And this is the transmitter. And these other bits probably serve some function or other... what does a perception filter do, anyway?"

"It changes your perception. You notice that something is there, but you don't _notice_ it. You won't put any effort into acknowledging it's existence. Amy, one of the people I was traveling with, had a whole room in her house that she didn't notice for twelve years."

"A whole room..." they said simultaneously, eyes meeting.

Kaito hectically started poking at the mechanism. "I thought there was something weird about this! I mean yeah, I could _tell_ that it was supposed to be an eight-year timer, but I could never figure out just _how_, because it's not connected to a proper locking mechanism. It just _looks_ like it is!"

Aoko raised an eyebrow. "Does it actually look like an eight-year lock, or is it just making you _think_ it's an eight-year lock?"

Kaito sat back, propping himself up with his hands. "...Woah. We won't ever know, will we?"

Aoko shrugged. "I guess not."

Kaito snorted. "Explains a few things though. Once you went into the upstairs room when the painting was turned the wrong way, and I was panicking like you would not believe. You grabbed the book you were looking for and left, not looking at it once." Kaito quickly hopped up, brushing his hands off on his pants. "Now! Where were we before we were distracted?"

Aoko also stood up. "Just one question: how is there a car? We're not going to wonder about why at the moment, just _how_."

Kaito smirked knowingly at her. "Magic."

"I know you like to use that excuse, but there's no way sleight of hand got _that_ in. How on earth did it get in here?"

Kaito scratched the back of his neck. "Honestly, you'd have to ask Dad. I'm pretty sure it was Magic though."

"Kaito, there's no such thing as Magic."

"Yeah there is. Go ahead, name something from your house. Anything."

Aoko folded her arms. "Okay. My hairbrush."

Aoko's hairbrush, complete with hair stuck in it, appeared in Kaito's hand. "There is such a thing as Magic."

He handed it to Aoko, who stared at it blinking for a few moments before slipping it into her purse. "I'll add that to my list of things to just smile and nod to, and think harder about later." She started wandering around the room, looking at the shelves and tables cluttered with junk. "But Kaito, why do you have all this alien tech lying around?"

Kaito frowned. "It isn't alien, it's Dad's stuff. I'm sure he just got it all somewhere."

"_Where_ somewhere?" Aoko pointed at a singed bit of metal. "_That's_ half a sonic screwdriver. And this is an anti-gravity unit," she continued, pointing at something else. "And see, you do have a Vortex Manipulator!"

"What the hell is a Vortex Manipulator?"

"Time travel! Kaito, this is all alien tech! Your dad was collecting alien tech!"

There was silence for a long time as they both thought very hard on all this. When Kaito continued to say nothing, Aoko spoke again. "Kaito, start at the beginning and tell me everything you know. _Everything_."

* * *

**We'll just refer to the Vortex Manipulator as Schroedinger's Birthdate, shall we? ********Now I really want to write two things: Aoko's POV for Spare Room, and a Kaito/Jack pairing. Or Toichi/Jack. Either works. They're both kinda psychic. Reviews please?**


	26. Time and Space and Kidnapping

**Time and Space and Kidnapping**

**Timeline: Really early Series 5**

**Summary: The world was on the verge of destruction once again, and the Doctor was going to save it. Then Aoko objected to him stealing the chocolate pudding.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito. Do you _want_ to know what would happen if I did?**

**Notes: And this is how Aoko joined the TARDIS. In other news, I've been thinking that Rift HQ Japan needs a team name. What do you, the reviewers, think? (Read: suggestions are welcome.)**

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Amy was _very_ satisfied. The Doctor generally considered this sort of satisfaction a bad thing for him. They had just spent over an hour in the Hakuba mansion, Amy and Saguru talking about their adventures and the Doctor fiddling around boredly. He had never known a former companion and a new regeneration to clash so badly before. Well, it probably helped that he didn't use to make a habit out of this, but still. As an example, they had started out insulting each other's fashion sense and it had degenerated from there.

Amy was amused. The Doctor certainly preferred her that way, but not this kind of amused.

Saguru had apparently deduced (and correctly) that the Doctor was about to break something due to various reasons, not the least of which being boredom. He and Amy had traded phone numbers and tips, and promised to keep in touch, and then Saguru had sent the two of them packing. And the Doctor was unable to steal the book back.

And then they'd been sidetracked in the direction of a convenience store of all things. The Doctor was secretly pleased, as it was now Amy's turn to be annoyed as he searched for the source of the sonic screwdriver's beeping. He had just finished with toiletries, and was moving onto bottled drinks, when a young woman walked up to them. "What are you doing?" she asked quizzically.

"A crashed spaceship," the Doctor answered distractedly, clearly not thinking.

The girl raised an eyebrow, clearly disbelieving. "Right, and that's some sort of energy detector?" she queried sarcastically, referring to the sonic screwdriver the Doctor was waving at the shelves.

The Doctor blinked twice, finally looking at her. He glanced away and saw that Amy was looking at the magazine rack. "Uhh, yes. I'm looking for something odd. Anything odd happen here in the past few days?"

The girl shrugged. "I wouldn't know, I don't usually come here. It's a bit out of my way. But I did notice that the pudding has fuzz," she pointed at the offending containers of chocolate pudding. "Sucks too, I was going to get some for Kaito."

The Doctor grinned, raising his eyebrows. "Is Kaito your boyfriend?"

The girl turned red and started sputtering. "Don't be stupid! We've just known each other for ever!"

The Doctor decided that he liked this one. He wanted to keep her. "What's your name?"

"Aoko, Nakamori Aoko."

"I'm the Doctor," he introduced as he wandered towards the pudding.

"Just the Doctor?" Aoko asked, following him.

The Doctor focused the sonic on the pudding. "Just the... oh dear, that's not good at all."

"What's not good?"

The Doctor pocketed the screwdriver and held one of the pudding cups up to eye level. "See that fuzz? That's what's not good."

Aoko looked close, and frowned. "What I don't get is how sealed pudding could even get fuzz."

"It's the glue used to attach the lid to the cup. They absorbed some of it to make tiny tunnels through which to go. I'm sure that if I opened this it would come off much easier than normal. But I won't, because that would be dangerous."

"'They'?" Aoko asked, latching onto the one thing that she hoped could be easily explained.

"The pudding spores. Biological warfare, used by the Tollans on Yaris 5 against their enemies that Paxtraxnix. They manufacture microscopic pods using nanotechnology, and stick minuscule spores inside them. They then launch them en masse at the targeted planet, and the spores infest the Paxtraxnix food supply, which just so happens to be very pudding-y. One of the pods must have malfunctioned or something, gotten lost and then crash-landed here. And hey look, pudding! And so the spores are released and go about their biological instinct to spread and multiply. The problem is that once they're mature they pollinate, and that would be really, really bad. The Paxtraxnix have developed a vaccination so they're not worried about much other than a dwindling food supply. But you humans would quickly be decimated. No, bad word. Exterminated is also a bad word. I really need a thesaurus, I'm running out of ways to say 'destroyed'. Slaughtered? Annihilated? Massacred? Eradicated?"

"Doctor? Pudding spores?" Aoko reminded him.

That snapped him out of it. "Oh, right. Amy!" he beckoned.

She glared, stuck the magazine she was perusing back on the rack, and walked over. "What? Find your aliens?"

"I need you to cause a distraction while I steal these!" he answered, gesturing to the pudding cups.

Amy blinked twice. "The pudding is alien?"

"No, but the fuzz is. And I need some of it to figure out how to stop it. And I don't have any money. Distraction please."

"You people are horrible," Aoko commented dirtily. "How much do you need?"

"All of it, don't want to take any chances," the Doctor answered distractedly.

Sighing, Aoko gathered it all up. The Doctor and Amy stared at her as she took it over to the cash register and bought all of it. Once it had been bagged and handed to her she turned back to them. "Are you coming or not? And where are we going?"

Amy elbowed the Doctor. They quickly walked towards the door. "Come, I'll take you to the TARDIS. That's where we're going."

He and Amy led the way as Aoko jogged after. "The TARDIS? What's that?"

The Doctor rudely swiped the plastic bag full of chocolate pudding from her. "It's the TARDIS. Does it need any more description?" Eleven bodies worth of companions and hanger-oners, and as much as the Doctor liked showing off his TARDIS it did get a little old explaining it to them every single time. "You'll see when we get there. Speaking of which," and they turned a corner to see a large-ish blue box parked next to a phone booth. "Here we are!"

"Here we where?" Aoko countered.

"The TARDIS!" the Doctor announced as he flung open the doors. "Home sweet home! Amy, keep Aoko entertained, I'm going to be in the lab analyzing this. Don't break anything!" And with that he strode off down the hall in the direction of the lab.

Amy looked at Aoko, who was walking slowly in awe towards the console. "It's bigger on the inside," she said dreamily.

Amy slumped to the side, letting out air. "Yes it is. Yes it is."

* * *

After about an hour the Doctor emerged from the lab to fiddle with some TARDIS controls. When he was apparently done he wiped his hands against each other. "There, that should do it! I found a frequency that the spores are weak to and just broadcast it around the world, just in case. They're all dead now, the only thing that remains is for the humans to throw away the rotten pudding."

"The humans?" Aoko asked. "You aren't human?"

The Doctor turned to Amy. "Didn't you explain anything? What have you been doing?"

"We played chess." Amy gestured to a board clearly displaying the white king's quickly approaching crushing defeat by the black pieces. Amy's crushing defeat it seemed, from the way the two of them were sitting.

"Right. Well then! Aoko, how do you feel about a trip?"

"I- what?"

"Good!" the Doctor exclaimed, more or less completely ignoring her. "Here we go!"

He slammed down on a few TARDIS controls and the time machine roared to life. Amy and Aoko immediately each grabbed on to something. "What the hell's happening?" Aoko demanded.

"We're taking off!" Amy informed her.

"We're _what?_ It's a box!"

"And the fact that it's bigger on the inside and inhabited by an alien didn't clue you in that something was up?"

"This is kidnapping!"

"You're telling me. Doctor, where are we going?"

"Don't know, I've got the randomizer on!"

Amy looked at Aoko. "I hope you're wearing practical shoes," she informed her, rolling her eyes.

Aoko raised her eyebrow. "Do I want to know why?"

Amy thought on that. "No, not really."

"You're both mad. Completely insane."

"All the best people are!" the Doctor grinned from the console.

Aoko contemplated that for a quick moment, and Kaito's grinning face popped up in her mind's eye. "Yeah, I suppose that's true," she admitted. And she thought that maybe, just maybe, this Doctor fellow was also just the right kind of insane.

* * *

**I swear, Seventh Sanctum gave me pudding spores. I swear it. And how could I not run with it? (Therefore, any similarity to an SJA episode is mostly unintentional.) Reviews please!**


	27. Time and Space and Hypervodka

**Time and Space and Hypervodka**

**Timeline: Kaito and Aoko are distant future, Toichi is distant past, and Jack is pre-Doctor**

**Summary: If nothing went wrong, then it would be their first proper date in ages. Dead men walking and Time Agents count as went wrong.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito**

**Notes: I know his name isn't actually Jack. Convenience's sake people.**

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The particular street out of millions in the depths of the mega-metropolis becomes busier and louder as dusk turns into night and the clubs start to really get crowded. But there's room for everyone, as supply and demand long ago made this street devoted to after-dark entertainment. Kaito and Aoko are glad they've found it; if nothing goes wrong, it will be their first proper date in ages.

(Just to make sure that what went wrong last time doesn't go wrong this time, the once-stolen Vortex Manipulator is safely tucked into a secret pocket in Kaito's clothes. Now they just have to stay together, and any sticky situations should easily be gotten out of. Should be.)

Aoko's badgering Kaito again, but that's nothing new on their dates. "So? What are we going to tell the guard this time?"

"That he's going insane?" Kaito grinned. "Who's going to believe him? The burdened girlfriend going to visit her boyfriend in prison, and then poof! They're gone! Where'd they go! Then poof, they're back and they claim they never went anywhere! Who's going to believe him?"

"The security footage will."

"The lack of explanation won't. How do you explain vanishing into thin air and then reappearing to a normal person?"

"Magic," Aoko grinned, and Kaito knew he'd won. Inspector Nakamori may shout all he wants about how Kaito Kid can do anything, but that won't mean a thing unless he can explain how. And regardless of implications he still has a soft spot for his daughter, so if Aoko says nothing happened then he'll mostly shut up. It's how they got rid of the evidence.

Kaito's a horrible influence on people. Absolutely horrible, and he knows it. He tries to take it in stride, but sometimes he wonders if Aoko would be better off not knowing him. Then he remembers that every good time traveling honorable thief needs an accomplice they can trust, so he deals with it in his own way.

"Hey," Aoko interjects into his thoughts, "How about that one?" she points.

"I wouldn't suggest it," a voice says from behind them. "The drinks there are outrageously priced, and the bouncer's just xenophobic enough that it affects his judgment."

Kaito and Aoko turned around to face whoever it was who had talked, Kaito speaking as they did so. "Then where do you..." The words died in his throat and his eyes went slightly wide. Because Poker Face didn't usually account for the walking dead.

"There's a really good club just down the street though, quite exclusive. Fortunately a friend of mine is waiting for me there, so I can get us all in if you'd like, Kaito," Toichi said, smiling softly, mysteriously.

"Toichi-ojisan!" Aoko exclaimed. Kaito merely stared numbly. "But..." Aoko dribbled off, glancing at Kaito.

"I'd know that mop of hair anywhere, no matter how old you are," Toichi kind of explained. "Now, how about that drink?"

Kaito's face lit up as he realized just what was going on. "Sure. Fantastic."

Toichi motioned for them to follow, and turned away. Kaito started to do so, but Aoko grabbed his arm. "Kaito, are you sure about this?" she hissed.

Kaito smiled truly, and Aoko found herself wondering how long it'd been since she'd seen that smile on his face. Not for a long time. "More sure about it than anything else."

"But it's dangerous!" she argued. "The wrong word at the wrong time-"

"I know," Kaito cut her off.

"Are you two coming?" Toichi called back.

"We'll just have to be careful, won't we?" Kaito said, then jogged so as not to lose Toichi in the crowd. Sighing, Aoko followed, cursing whatever it was within her that made her put up with this moron.

"It's nice to see that you two are still together," Toichi commented once she'd caught up. "You've only just met when I'm from."

Kaito and Aoko looked at each other, the clock tower meeting still clear in their minds after all these years. Then Aoko remembered when Kaito told her why he'd 'stolen' it. Right, that was why she put up with him. "Then you're from _way_ back there," Kaito commented.

"Yeah, but I'd still know you anywhere!" Toichi grinned, ruffling Kaito's hair. He led them into a club that looked much more sedate from the outside than all the other ones. The inside though was just as raucous as all the other ones appeared from the outside.

They had barely taken two steps in before a great big bear (literally) of a bouncer blocked their way. "Members only," it grunted, and folded it's arms for effect.

"Don't worry Brosnik, they're with me," an American man said as he stepped up and put his hand on the bear's shoulder.

The bear glanced between the American and Toichi, growled, and then lumbered off. Now that the American wasn't in the bear's shadow anymore they could see that he was quite young, and dressed in quite the clothes. Glittery red bell-bottoms made out of some stretchy alien fabric, a t-shirt with a tuxedo image, and a band around one forearm that read 'Fezes Are Cool'.

Aoko giggled at that. Kaito didn't understand the point of it, mostly because the man was clearly not wearing a fez.

"Jack!" Toichi greeted the man. "It's been so long!"

The man called Jack slapped Toichi on the back. "Entirely my fault, I know. Bouncing around all day, and all I've got to do when I want to see you is ring you up."

"Ring me up, ring me down, ring me all the way around," Toichi replied simply, raising an eyebrow.

Something about the way this greeting was going was not sitting well with Kaito. If he had to admit it, he would say that there was a sinking feeling in his stomach.

"Are you saying that I'm not taking advantage of a good thing? 'Cause you know I'm always one for taking an advantage," Jack answered, also raising his eyebrow.

Oh god, dude was gay for Dad. Dude clearly had history with Dad. Kaito was done thinking now.

Jack focused his eyes on Kaito and Aoko. "Who're your buddies? I thought you said you were coming all on your lonesome?"

Toichi introduced them. "Jack, this is my son Kaito and his friend Aoko. Girlfriend?" he asked them, quizzical. "I'm not sure yet. Kaito, Aoko-chan, this is Jack. He's an old friend of mine."

Jack raised an eyebrow at Toichi. "Your son? Any particular reason you haven't mentioned him before? Trying to hide a cutie from me?"

Dude was gay for Dad _and _him. Kaito was having just a little trouble dealing with this. "He's five when I'm from. Clearly he's followed in my footsteps," Toichi explained.

"Ah, time travel. Wonderful stuff," Jack sighed, then gestured for the three of them to follow. "Come on, I've got a table near the dance floor and the hottest waitress in the joint. We can discuss business there."

"You brought us with you on a business meeting?" Aoko asked. "In a club?"

"The only way to mix business is with pleasure," Jack grinned back at her. "Speaking of which, either of you busy later tonight? I know a great hotel just a few blocks away with the biggest beds you've ever seen."

"Jack, he's an early twenty-first century kid," Toichi admonished. "Watch what you say."

Kaito, with a grin a mile wide, decided to play along. "We're not busy, except I'm not sure I want to share Aoko. She's all mine you see."

"Kaito!" Aoko smacked him with a scandalized exclamation.

The four of them sat down at the table that already contained an empty glass. As soon as they did a scantily clad green-skinned waitress with two small antenna on her head came over and set it on the tray she was carrying. "Can I get anything for you guys?" she asked, giving Jack a look.

"Now or later?" Jack asked.

An antenna wiggled. "Later is later. Now is now. What would you like now?"

"In that case we'll have hypervodkas all around. And you'll know where to find me later," Jack winked.

"Four hypervodkas, coming right up." The waitress sashayed away as Jack stared longingly at her rear without remorse.

"Is he always like this?" Kaito asked Toichi.

"This isn't even the worst," Toichi replied. He then opened the small bag he was carrying and pulled out a number of small objects and set them on the table, some of which Kaito recognized from the secret room. "Let's get this over with before you're too drunk to see straight. Do you know what any of these are?"

Jack glanced admiringly at the pile. "You've been holding out on me. Do you know how much some of this is worth?"

"No, that's why I'm asking you," Toichi said as if talking to a child. "Care to enlighten?"

Jack picked up something small with a speaker, screen, and several buttons. "This is a Chulan om-com device. Their nanogenes can tap into their psychic abilities to give them the ability to om-com without a device, but then they realized how much demand there was and started manufacturing handhelds. It's slightly psychic, just think of a speaker and it'll connect. However on the off-chance that it's not the right one the screen will show the speakers in the vicinity and you can select one manually."

"Sorry, what's om-com?" Kaito asked.

"Stands for omni-communication," Toichi explained. "So with this I could speak through any speaker? What's the range?"

Jack examined it closely. "This model, my guess is only a couple miles. Looks a little beat up though so it might be less." He then picked up something that Kaito and Aoko definitely recognized. "Half a sonic screwdriver, completely useless."

"Could it be made un-useless?"

"Depends on how much is left in working condition. Work for a pro only."

"Good thing I could count as one then," Toichi replied. He picked up a black tube about the length of a pen. "What's this?"

Jack gently grabbed it. "Something that should not be pointed at things. It's a Tissue Compression Eliminator. Turns your average Joe into a six-inch corpse. Not pleasant. Would you like me to take this off your hands?"

"Is there a safety switch?"

"Yeah, right here. It's turned on at the moment, thankfully."

Toichi took it back. "Then I'll hang onto it for a while."

Jack sorted through the rest of the junk. "Tapes of Captain Millenium and By the Light of the Asteroid, pocket magna-clamp," he said as he moved things to the side. He then poked around a giant tangle of wires, computer chips, and unrecognizable technology. "This _was_ a perception filter. Could still be, if it wasn't assembled by an idiot. Everything's put together wrong, and horribly tangled. Easily remedied though, it would just take some time." Jack picked up the last unanalyzed item. "Now this, this is amazing. My bosses would pay you handsomely for this."

"What is it?" Toichi insisted.

"It is just a single part of a Chameleon Arch, Time Lord technology. Do you have any idea how long we've been looking for even a microchip? And this is far more than a single microchip. The value in this is just staggering. Name your price, I'm sure I can get it for you."

Toichi started putting objects back in the bag, starting with the Chameleon Arch piece. "Sorry, not interested. You can have the tapes, I'll be keeping everything else."

"Toichi," Jack said seriously, "There isn't much that my bosses are above," he warned.

"Then you just have to keep your mouth shut about me having this," Toichi said, closing the bag. The waitress arrived with their drinks and he sipped from his gently before speaking again. "Please Jack. For me. Like you said, there's not much they're above. Even you should be able to imagine what they could do with this."

Jack downed his own hypervodka. "Fine. But for that you owe me a dance."

* * *

Hypervodkas, Kaito had decided, were not his best friend. Far from it.

The note on the end table said something about hangovers, and there was a red gummy thing next to it. Kaito took it and ate it. His headache of death slowly started to clear. It didn't help with his memory though. He started to go over what had happened to see if he could come up with most of it.

Jack had downed his drink, and started badgering Toichi to hurry up and finish his so they could dance. Kaito and Aoko stayed at the table sipping their drinks, until Kaito decided to distract himself from their two companions by dragging Aoko out onto the dance floor. After that it slowly started to swim together. Dancing with Aoko, more drinks, getting jealous while Jack danced with Aoko, Toichi eventually vanishing, the green-skinned waitress...

Kaito's train of thought was disrupted by a groan coming from underneath him. He checked, then realized that it was from under the bed. He slowly crawled around to look at the foot of the bed. Two bare feet stuck out from underneath it and, as Kaito watched, wiggled as whoever was under the bed started to make their way out. And... oh.

Aoko, clad in nothing but a pair of panties, glared up at him from the floor. "Anthea took my bra," she complained.

"Anthea?" Kaito asked slowly, brain slugging to life.

"Anthea," Aoko repeated. "The Traxic." When Kaito continued to stare at her blankly, she elaborated again. "The waitress Kaito."

Oh right, Anthea the Traxic waitress...

Wait, what?

Kaito crawled back to the other end of the absolutely humongous bed and took a closer look at the note. Now that his headache was fading he could actually read the whole thing.

_Thanks for the great night! I hope you two have a way to get home on your own, at least I assume you do because you had to get here somehow in the first place. Anthea's already gone home, and I've got work to do. The gummies are for the hangover, trust me when I say that they work brilliantly. Here's to next time!_

_ Jack_

Not a jury in the world would convict Kaito for the particular crime he was planning at that moment. Not a jury in the world. Behind him Aoko cheered as she found Jack's armband behind the TV.

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**Once upon a time Eleven visited a primitive planet and accidentally started a fez cult. It is now a universal in-joke. Reviews please!**


	28. Ekoda Intermission the Fourth

**Ekoda Intermission the Fourth**

**Summary: Boys will be boys. And boys will do stupid, ridiculous things just to prove they're that good.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito.**

**Notes: Just saw Despicable Me. This was the car discussion on the way home.**

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Two hands slammed down on Kaito's desk. "Kaito, you need to stop doing shit like this. One of these days you're going to give my father a heart attack, and then nobody will be laughing," said the mouth attached to those hands.

"Chill out Aoko," Kaito lounged, grinning at the day's paper. "It's just a little graffiti."

"'_Just a little graffiti_'? Kaito, if you continue to do ridiculous stuff like this you're going to send his mind in circles wondering just _how_, and it's going to kill him!"

"And the best part is that he'll never figure out how. Quite brilliant, don't you think?"

"I can't decide whether it's brilliant or not if I don't know how you did it! Defacing public property, that's vandalism! Pointless vandalism!"

"I think the man in the moon looks much better with the new look. Don't you?"

Aoko's fingers twitched, as if they wanted very much to wrap themselves around Kaito's neck. "Kaito, remember the part where I can get you arrested with a single word? Don't push it. This is most definitely pushing it."

Kaito crossed his legs over the desk surface and spun the paper around so that Aoko could see what he was looking at. "Aoko, no one's ever done it before. I'm no longer just a petty thief, I'm _mythical_."

The picture on the front page of the paper was a very large blowup of the moon's surface last night. Inscribed upon it was a heist note, followed by a taunting "Come and get me!" and a very large Kid caricature. The wording of the whole thing implied that Kid's secret base was somewhere on the moon.

Aoko grabbed the paper, ripped it into many _very_ small pieces, then gave Kaito a cold, hard stare. There was no anger, no screaming, only a Look. Kaito gulped for drama, then decided to make a hasty retreat.

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The next night, the moon was miraculously back to normal. No one ever found out how it was done, and it was argued over for years to come. In some circles 'defacing the moon' became slang for doing something ridiculous and completely impossible just for the lols and with no malicious intent. Scientists were joining in on the hunt by the horde, intent on finding out just how Kid did it. After three of them nearly destroyed a museum with their Kaito Kid-catching contraption, Inspector Nakamori banned men of science from the premises of all heists. The Daily Show had a field _month_, and Steven Colbert took to asking interviewees if they next planned on sticking their John Hancock on the moon. And, of course, people started to wonder if Kaito Kid was an alien. There were other theories, but that was by far the most popular.

And, somewhere in time and space, a Time Lord's hand met his forehead, before said forehead repeatedly met the Time Rotor of his TARDIS. And he decided that words needed to be had.

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**The crack, it is gorgeous!**


	29. Toichi's Travels in Time

**Toichi's Travels in Time**

**Timeline: All over the place.**

**Summary: Kuroba Toichi is not a Fact, because that would make him like Jack Harkness. He is, however, a Common Observance. Time travel is like that sometimes.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito.**

**Notes: You know your fic is seriously screwed up when you can write a chapter focusing on a character who has been dead since the beginning of time as the characters know it, and then ship him with every character in it. Also, Obscure Joke Reference: ****In About Time V.1 (best DW reference series ever), they go into a lengthy debate on whether or not Marco Polo was really Marco Polo, based on historical evidence discovered since 1960-whatever.**

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Kuroba Toichi has a nasty habit of showing up in places he isn't expected. This is a Common Observance. Not a Fact, because that would make him like Jack Harkness, and we're not going there... at least not yet.

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For instance there was the unofficial graduation party for St. Oscar's University on Dellah. Toichi was an old friend of one of the graduates, and besides that no one threw parties like the students at St. Oscar's. The Doctor was not expecting to run into him there, he had just popped in when he saw the name River Song on the graduates list. As it turned out the two of them were dancing together rather intimately, River clutching a beer bottle for dear life and looking more than slightly tipsy. After a while Toichi spun her towards the Doctor and asked him if he would like to cut in.

River looked at him like he'd grown a second head. "D'you know this weirdo?"

Toichi raised an eyebrow. "You don't?"

"'Course I do. He's been stalking me for weeks." She took a long swig from the beer bottle, spilling some. "Come on, I wanna dance," she complained, trying to drag Toichi back out onto the floor but instead tripping over her own feet.

Toichi held her up, then foisted her off on the Doctor. The Doctor plucked the bottle from her hand and set it down on the table. "I've been stalking you for weeks? Now why would I do that?"

"Don't look at me, you're the weirdo. You gave me a notebook and said it would come in handy."

The Doctor started aiding her in leaving the party. "River Song, I think it's time I showed you the universe."

* * *

And then there was Marco Polo. They didn't talk about Marco Polo. The Doctor had called Toichi out on being out of his time, at which point Toichi smiled secretively and said that he'd always wanted to meet Marco Polo, and you never knew when you suddenly wouldn't be able to. He'd then proceeded to get close to Susan and Ping-Cho, rather closer than the Doctor would have preferred.

The Doctor at the time had the sneaking suspicion that Toichi was trying to figure out who the man claiming to be Marco Polo really was. Later on, after a few more chance encounters with the man, he had come to the conclusion that with Kuroba Toichi one never truly knew.

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Once, Kuroba Kaito had been shocked to find Toichi on his front porch looking older and more tired than he had ever seen him. "I'm going to die," Toichi said simply.

Kaito opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. What could one say to something such as that? "We all do eventually," he finally replied.

Toichi held up a hand. "It's okay, it's not anything you said. Well, I have had my suspicions for a while now, but I've recently more or less received a confirmation in-timeline."

"Are you going to do anything about it?"

"Since I'm dead by now, I assume that I already did."

Kaito got what Toichi was getting at. "You can always rewrite history."

"You can't rewrite history, not one line," Toichi murmured.

"Sorry?"

"Nothing. Just spent some time with some Aztecs, that's all."

"I've missed you," Kaito said to fill the silence.

"I know," Toichi smiled back. "What I'm hitting myself over is how long it took me to realize that."

Aoko was surprised, but not that much, when she came home from work to find Toichi playing with the grandchildren that wouldn't be born for tens of years. She'd long ago stopped being shocked by the impossible.

* * *

"Jackiiee boooyy!"

In one fluid motion Ianto pulled out his gun and spun around, turning the business end on the intruder. Toichi's hands went up. "Yeah, I suppose I should've expected that."

"Identify yourself!"

"It's all right Ianto," Jack soothed as he stepped down the stairs from his office. "Toichi's an old friend of mine. Put the gun away."

"Oh, like all the other ones?" Owen snarked.

"Unlike the other ones, Toichi is not here to kill me. At least I think he isn't. Are you?"

Toichi waved at Jack. "Nah, just heard you were hanging around here so I popped over from Skaro. Had some business there."

Jack greeted Toichi in a hug. "What the hell were you doing on Skaro?" he asked, incredulous. "How'd you get out alive?"

"Barely," Toichi said darkly. He then lightened the mood considerably. "Anyway! Nothing to fear from me, but you might want to stay away from Kaito for the next millennium or so. He's a little mad at you, which is a little understated."

"No fatherly wrath?"

Toichi grinned evilly. "Trust me, once Kaito gets his mitts on you anything I could possibly do to you will be done a thousand times over. I have faith in him. He talks tough but he's still a twenty-first century kid at heart. Getting him drunk and taking him, his girlfriend, and the waitress to bed all at the same time was not a good way to ingratiate yourself with him."

Owen, if nothing else, looked slightly jealous.

"Anyway," Toichi kept going as he started rummaging through his bag, "I'd heard you were no longer at the Time Agency and had taken up the good fight. Here, have a Chameleon Arch piece. I have no use for it, so maybe your knowledge can put it to good use." He set the offending bit of technology on the table next to him. "Anyway, sorry to chat and run, but you know how dangerous hanging out in the near future is. Spoilers abound!"

He tapped some coordinates into his vortex manipulator and vanished just as Gwen and Tosh were coming through the door with lunch. Tosh gaped. "Was that... Toichi Kuroba?"

"Yeah," Jack nodded. "He left some technology for you to look at."

"But he's dead," Tosh pointed out, befuddled, as she set the takeout down.

"Yeah," Jack said quietly. "Yeah he is."

* * *

"You can time travel?"

The blond was quite excited, and Toichi decided to indulge her. "I have here a vortex manipulator. Anywhere, anytime that I please."

The blond, whose name he really had to get, suddenly grabbed his wrist and held it up to her face. "This is a time machine? Can it be hooked up to a spaceship?"

Toichi gently unwound her fingers from his wrist with his other hand and pulled back, rubbing his wrist slightly. "Yes, but I can't let you have it. Without it I won't be able to get my business done, or even get home."

The blond was crestfallen. "I don't suppose you know where another one is."

Toichi grinned. "Actually, I do."

Toichi and Jenny spent the better part of a week tracking down another vortex manipulator. After that it was only a few hours between them to hook it up to Jenny's spaceship. They made a quick, rough jump. Afterwards Toichi and Jenny shared a wry look, and spent another week trying to streamline things a little. They made another quick jump, and were satisfied by the results. That night was spent celebrating in a nearby bar.

When Toichi was satisfied that Jenny was prepared for the universe and getting ready to go back home, she was in the company of an eighteenth century Scotsman that she was rather taken with. Toichi hoped that she took him with her. He had a lonely look in his eyes, like he was missing something terribly. Perhaps the universe was just what the doctor ordered.

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When one finds a strange, handsome man in one's attic going through one's belongings, one can generally do one of two things. They can do the logical thing and call the police whilst attempting to bar the intruder from leaving, or they can pin him to the wall and proceed to ravish him.

Unfortunately for Toichi Sarah Jane Smith was a little level-headed to be doing the latter. "That's my equipment you've got there," she pointed out.

"Yes, yes it is," Toichi said, sending her a winning smile. "And you probably wouldn't understand if I told you why I was taking it, so I won't try and bother," he didn't explain as he continued to go through her stuff, putting some of it in a bag as he went.

Sarah proceeded to attempt a combination of options one and two and tried to pin Toichi to the wall. He gently twirled away and ended up against the opposite wall. Sarah turned and glared. "I said that you're taking my equipment. Why?"

Toichi pulled something from a shelf and held it up to the light. "Yes, you've said it's your equipment twice. But what do you actually use it for?"

"Work," Sarah responded, wondering how much this man actually knew. "Are you from Torchwood?" she blurted out, her curiosity getting the better of her.

"No," Toichi answered seriously, and Sarah felt that he was telling the truth. "I work alone. I also usually work on the other side of the world, but your collection... attracted me."

Sarah took advantage of Toichi's momentary distraction with one of her artifacts and tried to pin him to the wall again, this time successful. "And what about my collection attracted you?" she hissed at him. "What do you want from me?"

Toichi used another one of his winning smiles. "I merely want to know what a sweet girl like you is doing with all this dangerous alien technology. You could get hurt you know."

"Or I could stop other people from getting hurt. I could help people," Sarah responded.

"It seems we're in the same line of work. You want to trade pointers?"

"My line of work doesn't involve ransacking people's attics."

Toichi's voice lowered to a near-whisper. "I wouldn't say that. I'm merely more flamboyant in how I go about it. After all, our cover stories are vastly different."

"I'm a journalist," Sarah enunciated clearly.

"And I'm a phantom thief. But we both know that the truth is vastly different from what the rest of the world thinks."

"You're a criminal," Sarah accused.

"No, I am a creative artist who takes his prey in style." He paused, studying her face. "Can I trust you with these dangerous toys?"

"Well I haven't blown myself up yet."

Toichi set his bag down on the floor, then gave Sarah a quick kiss. "Sayonara, ojou-san," he whispered before he nudged her away from him and vanished in a flash of blue light.

Sarah sighed and set to work putting everything back where it belonged. If nothing else, the man certainly knew where the value was.

* * *

It was the night of the meltdown of the Villengard reactor. In the morning, if the factory still existed, an interesting conversation would exist on the security cameras. However since the factory wouldn't exist in the morning, the tapes would never be watched and no one would ever be privy to it.

It went something like this:

"As a father, I don't approve of your habit of carrying explosives around."

"It's called Nitro-9!"

"Would you two stop arguing and give me a hand with this? We don't have all night and I would like to get the bananas planted before the next century!"

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**Pairings, in order: Toichi/River, Toichi/Susan/Ping-Cho, Toichi/Aztec, Toichi/Jack, Jack/Kaito/Aoko/Anthea, Toichi/Dalek, Toichi/Jenny, Toichi/Jenny/Jamie, Jenny/Jamie, Toichi/Sarah Jane, and Toichi/Nine/Ace.**

**Or that could just be me. Maybe I've finally gone mad. I'm actually quite taken with the idea of Jemie. Or Janny. Jenmie? JenJam?**


	30. Time and Space and Introspections

**Time and Space and Introspections**

**Timeline: Fuck the timeline. It's sort of Series 4, in the way that it creates a snarl by mentioning things that take place during it. But no one ever said this fic was logical. No one said it was a strict progression of cause to effect. It's more of a big paper ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey... fic that ran away with me.**

**Summary: An echo and the man who gave it life get an introspective moment on the meaning of life. One finds it far more satisfying than the other.**

**Disclaimer: Because blatant disregard for canon, fanon, etcetera totally screams that I'm in charge. Actually... That's actually kind of sad once you think about it. Don't own.**

**SLIGHT SPOILERS FOR LATEST CASE.**

**Notes: Somehow, Merlin knows how, my thoughts went from Castle in the Sky to this. And just typing that sentence made me think about Merlin... + Saturday = BRB GTG FIND WATCHABLES!**

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What was he doing here? What was his purpose?

Man had been asking these questions since Time Immemorial. They didn't always mean the same thing. It depended on who was asking, and how the asking came about. Some men asked what they were doing somewhere doing something when they could be somewhere else doing something else. Some men wondered just what cog they were in the corporate machine, and if they were really necessary at all.

Some men, himself included, asked it along the lines of Life, the Universe, and Everything. If it could be said that he was a man. He had barely been a man before, a mere seventeen years of age, and now... now he was anything but. He was a child, an aberration, a freak of nature, an anomaly of Time. The earth whirled around him, going onwards while he stayed perfectly still.

Don't get him wrong, he wasn't immortal. He wasn't a Fact, like Jack. Jack observed while the world continued. He had been plucked cleanly from the face of the Earth, pulled out of Time entirely as everything was slowly stripped from him. And no one missed him, for he did not exist. He did, in a sense. He took up physical space, people knew that he existed as a separate corporeal being, but they, the ones that really mattered, did not miss him. They had a perfect carbon copy, talking and sleeping and _breathing_ like him, exactly like him.

Except it wasn't like that, and he had no reason to resent that other him. How could he, when he himself was the copy? The abnormality, the freak? He was the one that didn't belong, not the other. Not the one living their life, carefree in ways that he himself was not.

Carefree. That was a word that he would never have used to describe himself before that year-long, never happening, never existing debacle. With the weight of the world on his suddenly smaller shoulders, a secret organization out for his blood, a wonderful girl he should not have had to lie to but instead did every day and felt horribly guilty for. Possessing a secret that could kill. Carefree. Hah. Then his world had come tumbling down around him in a spray of blood, and he realized how naïve he had been, how much incredibly worse things could always get.

When he'd first shrunk, he'd been worried first and foremost about the Organization not finding out who he was, lest they kill him and all who knew. It had never even occurred to him that a third party would find out and want to learn why. It'd never occurred to him that he'd become a lab rat for a megalomaniac. That he'd spend a year in captivity, in pain, as everything that he was was stripped from him.

He still had nightmares about that day. The day where the Master thought he had Martha Jones in a trap, cornered on an unassuming island nation. Laughing at a joke that only he got as he turned the full might of an alien tech enhanced airship on the unassuming island nation, using a flamethrower to kill a fly. Being forced to watch as Japan burned in flames and sank in water, all at once, a hundred million people crying out for mercy.

And yet, the flamethrower was unsuccessful. The fly still eluded flattening, escaping while everything he knew burned. He had no doubt that everyone he had ever known was dead. Even if they had managed to escape they were not the kind to roll over and take world domination lightly. They were all dead, it was implausible that they weren't. And he started to look for escape, any kind he could take.

Once, during a down moment from saving the world, Hattori had tried asking him just what made him different from the other one. Not how he was created; he heard that from the Doctor. He wanted to know how he was different. Conan had responded with so little it wasn't even a story, let alone a full one. But it was enough. Hattori had understood, and never brought the topic up again.

The universe was large, and dark, and deadly, and he wanted to return to his relatively simple life so badly. But the universe was all he had left, for the Earth was not for him. So he lived each day at a time, never wondering what would come next because he daren't imagine. It wasn't as bad as all that really, but surrounded with reminders as he was he couldn't help but feel jaded. At a spoken word Donna or Saguru could go straight home. The situation of Hattori and his mother was a little different, but at least they still had a home planet. The Doctor was as homeless as he, but at least the Doctor wasn't surrounded by temptation. At least the Doctor only saw his home in dreams and memories. He was surrounded by a planet that didn't want him anymore. He was obsolete, last apocalypse's model.

Which brought him back to his pondering. What was he doing here, and what was his purpose in life? Why did he exist? He could give specifics of how he came into being, but he didn't want specifics. He wanted some broad answer that could get him to stop moping. He wanted a Life, the Universe, and Everything answer. He wanted an answer that wasn't Grow Up (Again), Save the World a Couple Dozen Times, Get Killed Heroically in Battle. Because as delusional as the rest of the crew were, he knew that that was the best he could hope for. Unless he managed to get his head back on straight, which he knew to be unlikely, he would never find a nice planet and a nice girl to settle down on.

The nice planet was unlikely. The nice girl was nigh impossible, for there had only ever been one nice girl for him. And as he stared at the nice girl from his sequestered spot, he knew that it would be that way until he died in battle. What were the odds that they'd be in London at the same time? Him, watching from the shadows as she stumbled upon and over a case, a riddle for Holmes himself.

He watched him – the _real_ him – chase after her. He wondered idly if he'd said anything yet. His attention was drawn from her for a mere moment as their eyes met, and his eyes widened imperceptibly. He sent his other self a Look, though if asked to describe it he wouldn't have been able to. Then the moment was broken and the chase through London resumed.

He knew what that man's answer was: Find (Permanent) Cure, Defeat Organization, Marry Nice Girl, and Live Happily Ever After. He just wondered if he could find his own answer.

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He had long suspected that there was more to the world than it let on. That in all the mysteries he could unravel, he would never unravel the one that really mattered. Not that murderers and thieves didn't matter; they just didn't matter as much.

He remembered, clear as day, that brief meeting with that brief man, and the hints that had been placed before him. He remembered everything that didn't make sense no matter how hard he tried. He remembered impossible heists, men of metal, aliens, and, briefly, spaces that were larger on the inside. And sometimes he had nightmares of a burning Japan, a madman, and aliens that weren't. He would launch from sleep covered in sweat and, try as he might, find it illogically impossible to console himself with the thought that such a thing could never happen.

He had more pressing matters at hand, but whenever they weren't pressing in on all sides he took a breather and contemplated the impossible. He contemplated how such things could possibly be, each theory both more ridiculous and more likely than the last. Sometimes he thought he was going mad. Once he'd asked Kid if the thief had control over the fabric of reality, just on a whim. Kid had taken it in enough stride that he didn't know what to think, and he'd ended up back where he started.

Then, one day, he suddenly understood, in the way that he didn't really understand a thing but it still made sense in a very indescribable way. His eyes met with himself, except it wasn't him, there was something wrong and inherently different with this other him. Just the knowledge of another him should have sent his mind in circles until he went mad, but instead everything made sense. He understood, in the way that he really didn't, that something hadn't happened, and the world was a better place because of it. Something had happened and he was at the heart of it, and that other him was a dark echo of a time that never was. Somehow that other him remembered what had happened, and he himself didn't. He himself had his life, while the other him had nothing but begrudged him not.

Sudden clarity did nothing to answer the questions he had; if anything it created more. But the new questions he knew he did not want the answers. He did not want to know what this other him had to do with his nightmares of blood and fire and test tubes. He understood that those questions as well as a few others would never be answered, and if they were he would beg for them not to be. But he understood, in that way that he really didn't, that if answers were going to come they were going to come on their own good time. When he caught a murderer he used his knowledge of the world around him; he could never use his knowledge to answer these questions for the sole reason that he didn't have the knowledge necessary. He would have to wait for more data, possibly years, before he truly grasped what was going on.

As he chased Ran through London, he knew that he didn't mind a few years, or even a few decades. It would puzzle him to be true, but it wouldn't drive him to distraction wondering about it. As long as that other him was the echo and not he, that the nightmares stayed never happening, he didn't mind.

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**Good thing we know how this ends, otherwise I might just start crying. MERLIN, BE WATCHABLE FASTER!**


	31. Ekoda Intermission the Fifth

**Ekoda Intermission the Fifth**

**Summary: She knew the stars were a terrible place sometimes, but that didn't change what she thought. And Chikage wouldn't trade this life for the world when she already had the universe.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Magic Kaito.**

**Notes: A proper tribute to Chikage, other than that weirdness with a spare room. Ye be warned, for ahead lies timeline fuckery, make outs, continuity cavalcades, general insanity, and Jenny/Jamie.**

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He showed her the stars, and she thought it wonderful. She _knew_ that it was disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence, but that didn't change what she _thought_.

She'd thought him silly at first, a young man all bluster and bravado, nothing beneath worth searching for. He'd had the nerve to show up at one of her own affairs, give her a peck on the cheek, and then fly off on those white wings. She'd been more than surprised when he showed up on her front step the next day in his civilian persona to give her the heist he'd stolen, another kiss, and ask her out on a date.

She refused. He took this in good stride, and promised that he'd be back. As soon as the door closed she started wondering furiously just how he'd found out who she was.

He kept his promise. He was often there dogging her every step no matter what time of day. She got her breathing space to be sure, but he was never gone for more than a week. She started to think of him as her best enemy, and told him so. He smiled magnificently but managed to sound pouty when he stated that that wasn't his intention.

It was when he asked her how a heist had gone, she'd pointed out that he had stolen the show as always, and he responded with, "Did I?" that she began to wonder if perhaps something was up.

One day, before a heist but close enough that she was already in costume at the site, he snuck up on her without a sound, startling her. He said something about payback, kissed her passionately, and wove a white rose into her hair. He was gone as quickly and silently as he had come, and were it not for the rose she would have thought that perhaps she'd dreamt it all.

After the heist they ran into each other in an alleyway. He commented on the flower, wondering where she'd gotten it from. She had grown used to him being forgetful like this though, and instead stalked forward like a cat, telling him that she didn't know what his payback was for but that this was _hers_. And she pinned him to the wall and kissed him, hard, and he kissed back, and they were like that for a good few minutes until she simply had to breathe.

When she pulled back he asked her if the rose was from him just before the heist. Naturally she answered in the affirmative, but all thoughts of one-upping him vanished when he did as well: one moment he was in her grasp, the next he wasn't!

Then suddenly his voice was from behind her. "Messing around with things that have already happened is strictly forbidden... except for make outs." And then he'd held out his hand and asked her on a date, the second time he'd done so. And this time she accepted.

And she never looked back. She saw places she never thought she'd see, people she never thought she'd meet. She was charmed by a man named Jack, and found it sweet that although Toichi was okay with Jack flirting with him, Jack was absolutely point-blank not allowed to even _think_ about flirting with her. She'd made friends with a poor lost Scotsman while their respective significant others repaired Jenny and Jamie's spaceship. He had imparted to her the knowledge of the source of his magic, and then taken her on a joyride across Delta Vega. He took her to the Royal Palace on Peladon, the blue forests of Metabelis III, and (though she suspected it was on accident) the rainy slums of New Earth. And when she asked hesitantly afterward, he even took her to the destruction of Earth. Now that was an adventure. She is looking forward to 2005 when Rose Tyler will call her, just to keep the timelines in order.

And when she and Toichi accidentally got married on Abydos, she found that she didn't actually mind. An extended honeymoon whilst temporarily stranded in Peru singing folk songs cemented that idea, and they made it official as soon as they managed to get home. Their official honeymoon was camping on Shadow, which evolved from there into some space banditry which she absolutely adored. It seemed like a trick of fate when they took shelter for a night in an Indian orphanage, so she persuaded Toichi to stay for a while and help out the aging couple that ran it. She watched him bond with the children, and the children bond with him, and realized that everything would be okay.

She doesn't do nearly as much traveling these days; she slowed down after the orphanage, at first because Toichi wouldn't let her do anything, and later because she agreed with him. And of course traveling with a young child is always tough, no matter what the transportation. So now he goes off on his business trips alone, and she waves him off and tries not to hope that he doesn't get hurt this time, because just thinking about it is bad luck. And then he comes back and more often than not regales her and Kaito with tales of faraway planets, and Kaito grins and hugs him and says that his daddy tells the best stories ever. And of course Toichi always counters that by asking Kaito how he knows they're just stories, and they end up arguing over what out of all the stories is most likely to happen. Four-year-olds are terribly good at the adorable, "Because I said so," and she wonders how Toichi can stand up to it.

She watches the two of them at it, and knows that when Kaito is old enough to understand it will be wonderful. Jack stops by once and tells her about what he's been up to (stuck on Earth? Really?). When he spots Kaito his face breaks out into a wild grin and he ruffles the equally wild hair. Then her mother alarm goes off at something hinted in Jack's face, perhaps a memory seeing how time travel worked, and she kicked Jack out of the house, but not before he can tell her that last he heard Jenny and Jamie were expecting twins.

That night there's a small dinner party, just the Kudos and River Song invited. It's all of five minutes before Kaito and Shinichi are throwing four-year-old punches. Yukiko, glancing wryly at the others, assigns herself babysitting duty so that the others can talk business in peace. She is all for willful ignorance of such matters, deeming it none of her business since Yusaku isn't all that active in said business anyway. And when they sit down to eat Toichi keeps the youngsters distracted from each other by stories of alien menaces, and Chikage knows that she wouldn't trade this family for the world. After all, she's already got the universe.

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**The part of my brain insistent on spewing too much information would like to inform the reading public that the twins are named Donna and Martha, and that a fic detailing their first meeting with the Doctor is currently in development hell. Also, Abydos exists. It's a leisure planet, like Midnight. I'm pretty sure it was first mentioned in The Leisure Hive, making it older than the other one. Shadow, on the other hand... Reviews are adored!**


	32. Toichi's Temporal Troubles

**Toichi's Temporal Troubles**

**Summary: Kuroba Toichi would like to state that being dead is overrated. It generally leads to homelessness, destitution, and irony. Never trust a vortex manipulator.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Magic Kaito or Doctor Who.**

**Notes: Currently, this is questionable canon within the fic. On the one hand, it opens up so many possibilities that I really don't feel like dealing with, but on the other hand I really, really wanted to write it. So I wrote it, and am posting it regardless of how much of it actually happens within the fic or not. It's kind of like A Spare Room in that manner. Though I will admit to leaning towards writing more where this happens, so it'll probably end up fic-canon.**

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Once upon a time, there were two vortex manipulators.

Yes, that's right, _two_.

One of them worked. This vortex manipulator, for the most part, lived on the wrist of one Kuroba Toichi. The exceptions were at home and at the day job. It occasionally came in handy at the night job, and he needed it for the third job to even exist.

The other vortex manipulator was, to put it mildly, not so reliable. It fizzed and buzzed, overshot and undershot, and generally did not get you to where you needed to go. Toichi tinkered with it sometimes, trying to get it to work and knowing how handy it would be to have two of them. He always kept the working one on him when he did though, because he had yet to get it working enough for even a return trip, and it never took him to exactly where he was trying to go.

Then one day it all changed. Well, not in a day. It was over a period of several months that the world around him gradually shifted. And he was vaguely aware of it shifting, but he did not realize the significance until he realized, one day, that someone had painted a target on his back and he was in someone's metaphorical sights.

The realization, as you may have guessed, came as a bit of a shock. He ended up locking himself in the Kid Cave and going over everything that had happened, fitting it all in. And everything fit. And before he even knew what he was doing, he grabbed the working vortex manipulator off of the shelf and set the coordinates for the future.

And when he got back he cried, because he'd seen something that one shouldn't need time travel to see. Was he going to do anything about it? Well since he was dead by then he assumed he already did. But that was then and this is now, and he damn well was going to do something about it.

The vortex manipulator that worked was important. Kaito needed it, he knew Kaito had it, and even if he didn't he wouldn't deprive Kaito of the universe for anything, and since he was dead this probably wasn't going to work. Will be dead. So the one that worked was out of bounds. Toichi put it on a shelf and told himself not to touch it until this was all over, just in case.

The one that didn't always work, the questionable one, he took to wearing like a life raft. This was his plan, his plan that probably wasn't going to work and even if it did he'd still probably be thought of as dead, because that was what the future said. But he was doing something about it, and history could be rewritten maybe, even – especially – if it wasn't history yet. Possibly. In all of his run-ins with the Doctor, the Time Lord never could seem to decide on that point. So, Toichi was going to do something about it, and hope that he didn't rip reality apart in the process.

When the trigger was finally pulled, Toichi was ready. He wasn't expecting it to all happen quite so fast, but he probably should have known that it would have. It's like in fiction, either everything happens all at once or time slows down to a crawl, or both. Time slowed down enough for him to register screams, but at the same time he activated the vortex manipulator on instinct as fast as he could, because the flames were so sudden, speed of light.

Fortunately in the slums of New Earth it rains a lot, so the flames went out pretty quick. He was hanging on just enough to try and make the jump home, but as expected the vortex manipulator was done for. Catching on fire had not helped its lack of working. Fortunately a passing Not So Good Samaritan threw Toichi into the back of his car and then dumped him on the front step of a hospital, since apparently he was going that way, but not before a Definitely Bad Samaritan stole the vortex manipulator. Toichi hoped it dropped him on Skaro.

The people at the hospital were nice enough in treating his burns, up until the point that they realized that he was homeless and destitute. Once Toichi realized it, it came as a bit of a shock to him as well. Then they were less nice about it, and he did time in the local jail afterwards for not being able to pay his debts. This he found to be Irony with a capital I.

After he got out, he bounced around from job to job. Mechanic, cashier, bartender. None of them lasted long, because he was not native to the time zone and inevitably something happened that was beyond his knowledge and he was fired because of it. Eventually he came to the conclusion that earning a regular living was both boring and next to impossible, and took up performing street magic for tips again. This was of course not the most profitable thing he'd done since ending up on New Earth, but it was a sight more entertaining than cashiering.

It also turned out to be a good idea. One of the local bars eventually got tired of him drawing away their customers, and hired him as an on-site magician. They paid well, and after his intimate knowledge of drinks from a certain time came out, he could claim the title Magician and Drinks Specialist (20th Century). He did those drinks, the regular bartenders did everything else. And eventually the manager realized what a good thing he had going, and the bar shifted to a 20th century theme with Toichi as maître d' and magician extraordinaire. And he was loving it.

Of course he missed Chikage and Kaito, and the Kudos and the Nakamoris and all the others. But since there was no way at hand to get back to them and they thought he was dead anyway, it was best to at the moment move on and hope they were happy. And he knew that they would be happy eventually.

It was after he'd been working at the bar for two years that an opportunity presented itself. A humanoid with a slight green tint to otherwise pink skin and two antennae sticking out of messy black hair walked in, looked around, and made a beeline for Toichi. The man smiled at him, but Toichi could see through it. The man wanted to discuss business. After Toichi finished mixing a drink he turned all his attention on the strange man, who held out a card. Toichi tried not to show displeasure. Time Agent. The young man took the card back. "If I could take a few moments of your time discreetly?"

Toichi nodded. "Why don't you go sit at that table over there, and I'll be with you in a second." The man nodded and left. Toichi mixed one more drink to buy time to think about why a Time Agent would be here. If they knew something was up, then he could get into some trouble. But if they didn't know something was up and was here for completely innocent reasons, then he needed to not give them reason to think something was up. And even if it was innocent, as far as the Time Agency went innocent was a matter of opinion.

Toichi finished the drink, then walked over and sat in the chair opposite the young Time Agent. "I would say human, but..." Toichi started, gesturing at the antennae.

"My grandfather's Traxic," the young man answered, smiling. "You're not exactly discreet yourself."

Toichi's hand unconsciously moved towards the small burn scars left on his face. "There was an incident a couple years ago. What can I do for you?"

"Well, as cards are horrible ways of introducing oneself, the name's Kaito K'Tinnewae'tan."

"That's quite the mouthful," Toichi grinned. Kaito K'Tinnewae'tan grinned back, agreeing. "I'm Toichi Kuroba, though if you didn't already know that then I wonder why you want to talk to me." Kaito nodded. "Kaito... that's a nice name."

Kaito nodded again. "It's a family name. My grandfather was all for a traditional Traxic name, but my parents shot him down with the fact that the one he was thinking of is unpronounceable by human tongues. I'm fluent in Traxic and I can't even say it, can you imagine me having it?"

They laughed, and Toichi decided that he liked Kaito K'Tinnewae'tan. "So, what brings a Time Agent to my neck of the woods?"

Kaito looked around, as if avoiding the question. "Did you know that we often bring Time Agents here for training in 20th century culture? It's a bit eclectic, I'll give you that, but otherwise rather accurate. And I hear the accuracy is mostly your work."

"What about it?" Toichi asked, not quite liking where this was going.

Kaito looked back to Toichi. "I'll be frank with you: the Time Agency wants to hire you. We had an expert for the 1900-2400 era, but he disappeared several months back and we haven't been able to track him down. You seem to know all about it. A hobby, I suppose?"

Toichi nodded sheepishly, this being the last thing he expected. "Yeah. What would this job offer entail?"

"A lot of advisory and teaching work, really. What to expect, how to react, that kind of thing. Seminars for field agents, and the occasional field assignment if it's an emergency or we're feeling particularly strapped. You'd be surprised at the turnover rate. There's a few that have been in the Agency for years and years, but a lot that let the power go to their heads and disappear, or get killed, or what have you. And of course some of us, like myself, are banned from certain time periods just for being too noticeably out of place."

"So you want to hire me to make sure Agents going to the area that happens to be my hobby don't make complete fools of themselves and, failing that, send me in afterwards?" Toichi summarized.

Kaito nodded. "Yeah. If it's any help, the pay's good and there are lots of perks."

"Is that all the business you have to discuss?"

Kaito leaned back and folded his arms behind his head, smirking. "Yep, more or less."

Toichi made to get up. "What do you want to drink? First one's on the house."

"Vodka martini, shaken not stirred."

Toichi cocked an eyebrow. "You're not half-assed yourself."

One of Kaito's antennae twitched. "But as I pointed out, I'd be a little out of place. I'll be back in a week for your answer."

Toichi walked back behind the bar to mix a vodka martini, shaken not stirred, for Kaito K'Tinnewae'tan. As he did he glanced back at the young Time Agent, who was now conversing with a group of women at the closest table, antennae wiggling happily. Family name, huh?

Toichi had of course heard nothing but bad rumors about Torchwood at one point in time. Then there was that deadly fiasco with the Cybermen, and Torchwood One fell dramatically. After that he still heard a few bad rumors, but they weren't as bad. And some of the rumors he heard were actually good, thanks to Jack. Perhaps that was just the kind of thing the Time Agency needed.

And of course access to time travel via a vortex manipulator would not go unexploited. And that's the story of how Kuroba Toichi became a Time Agent.

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**Mwahahah. In unrelated news I've discovered radio on my music player, so I'm listening to a Beatles station. Yay! Reviews are adored!**


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